J'attendrai
by Noacat
Summary: After the war, Hermione makes a mistake. Or perhaps several mistakes... or maybe just the same mistake made over and over again. In the aftermath of the final battle, rather than deal with the disastrous consequences of a short lived friends with benefits arrangement with Harry, Hermione leaves England for a new life. H/Hr/no bashing/OCs/Sexual Content
1. Chapter 1

NEW STORY! And this one is a bit more shippy than the Homestuck crossover I'm writing. So, heads up... this will be H/Hr. If that's not your ship, hit that good ol' back button and find a different story. Also, this will include a personal headcanon of mine for a Jewish Hermione. Again, you disagree... there's a button for that and it's not the one where you leave me a review. Hit that close window button and find yourself a different tale to read, because this ain't for you. That being said, I am a gentile and while I've done my best to research traditions and culture, it is no substitute for lived experience. If you are Jewish, please feel free to PM me and send corrections. I'm trying my best, but sometimes your best is not always good enough. That being said, I hope you all enjoy the story. My update schedule, as always, is fucked.

Thanks for your time!

* * *

She had always been a little bit in love with him. From the moment they saved her from that troll, she knew she loved them both just a bit, though if she were to admit to anything it was always Harry she'd loved more. Ron had been correct during the Horcrux hunt, she had chosen Harry. Not at that moment, not really. The choice had been made years earlier. She had spent most of her time at Hogwarts saving him and finding five thousand different ways to pretend that all those times she did all those things was because he was just her friend, and not because she loved him.

Because in her heart of hearts, she knew girls like her couldn't fall in love with boys like him. Or more correctly, boys who were like Harry, good-looking and athletic, didn't fall for girls like her.

She didn't have nice smooth, straight hair you could run your fingers through. She had no figure to speak of, no warm curves a man liked to run his hands over. Her boobs weren't anything to write home about either. Too small to even be a handful... as Ron had complained more than once, as if she could do anything about it. And her face... well, she looked better after her teeth had been shrunk, but she knew she wasn't pretty. Sometimes she thought back to that time Harry had said that he didn't think she was ugly, which, at the time, had made her heart flutter. But on thinking about it, she realized it wasn't a compliment at all. Sure, she wasn't ugly, but that didn't translate into her being attractive.

It went beyond just looks though, she knew that. She could be most beautiful girl in the world, but her personality was perhaps the biggest deal breaker for someone like Harry.

She didn't understand Quidditch or even like it very much. She was abrasive. She was smart and that in and of itself wasn't bad. It was the fact that she flaunted it. That she refused to play dumb to make a boy feel better. She was an overly anxious, uptight rule monger; the kind of person that reminded you to floss or chided you like a child when you jaywalked. She was plain and boring. The human equivalent of that awful beige wallpaper found in every waiting room ever.

She was a thousand negative things all rolled into one that meant someone like Harry could never like her the way she liked him.

He liked pretty girls like Cho or Ginny, who didn't resemble waiting room wallpaper. Athletic girls. Girls who didn't argue with him the way she did, in that loud bossy kind of way. Hermione always had all the answers and everything she said was a put down, a way to belittle him. Even though she'd never intended it to be that way, that's how it came across. She was an insistent, strident nag and a relentless worry wart. She wasn't like Ginny, who could yell at him till she was blue in the face - but he'd listen, because the _way _she said it made him feel validated. She didn't make him feel small like Hermione did. Ginny defended him. Hermione harped at him.

And that was the vast, aching chasm she just could not bridge. No matter how hard she tried. So she kept her feelings deep inside as she told herself again and again to forget the possibility that someone like him could ever like someone like her.

She tried to move on. To settle. That's all that girls like her could ever really do - just find someone who'd take them; that one person in a thousand who could tolerate them for at least ten consecutive minutes. It was terribly depressing when she reflected on it. But she somehow managed to convince herself that it could be worse. As the Rolling Stones once said, you can't always get what you want and if you tried sometimes... you got what you needed.

Besides, Ron was a good man, anyone would be lucky to have him. He really could be someone she wanted, even needed. There were times where he could be a huge jerk but it was balanced out by how much he made her laugh. Yes, they fought all the time but it somehow worked for Hildy and Walter in 'His Girl Friday'. And if she couldn't trust her favorite screwball comedy, what could she trust? Ron was good and kind, and, no, he wasn't perfect but who was? And it wasn't like he didn't try.

So, she settled. But buried deep, deep down, there was a part of her that had never given up on Harry - she never really stopped loving him. How could she? But that part was very quiet now. She'd learned well how to swallow that bitter pill and make it seem like it was something sweet.

There were moments during the Horcrux hunt just after Ron left where she could almost believe she had half a chance. The way his hand would linger on hers when they'd apparate or the way he'd occasionally look at her when he thought she wasn't looking. But those observations were easily tossed aside because more often than not he spent his time staring at the Marauder's Map, watching Ginny's dot as it walked the halls of Hogwarts.

'_That is the reality_,' she'd tell herself.

When he looked at her, when his touched lingered it was only because he was a boy and she was a girl, and they were both lonely and scared. And when he danced with her one night, he came so very close to bridging the chasm that separated her from him. He was so close to making every wild day dream she'd ever had become a reality. They had only been a hair's breadth apart. There was a wild, almost terrible, pull towards him as she caught the desire lingering in his eyes. All she had to do was lean in... but she pulled away at the very last minute, even though it killed her inside to do so.

She was a warm body that was all. He didn't want _her_ specifically. Who he really wanted was the dot on that map and she'd just be the next best thing to that dot because she was here, the dot was not. It wouldn't really mean anything, to him anyway. Besides, it'd be wrong. A betrayal of the people they had committed themselves to and to the strict moral code she'd always held herself to. She wasn't a fool.

Not then, anyway.

There were more important things to worry about now. Whether or not someone fancied her seemed to be a rather juvenile thing to be concerned about when people were dying. Like always, she pushed those emotions deep inside and concentrated on how to help Harry win the war.

And just like that, the war was won. It was over. The world was safe as it could be. Standing in the ruins of Hogwarts, there was a single moment when she felt what triumph was supposed to feel like. It was soon buried under acres of rubble when the cost of victory became clear. So many people were dead.

Remus, though she could never bring herself to call him that. He'd always be Professor Lupin, who was hands down the best teacher she'd ever had - who had told her that she was the brightest witch of their age. A compliment that had meant so much to an insecure 14 year old girl and that she carried in her heart to this day. Tonks who was as good a friend as she was a mentor, almost like the older sister she wished she'd had growing up. But perhaps worst of all was Fred. He was closer in age to the rest of them. It didn't seem possible the world could go on without him, without any of them.

The Weasleys took the body home to arrange for a funeral days after the end of the battle. Hermione and Harry had briefly joined them, so they could attend. In the end, she didn't stay for long after. There was a feeling like she was an unwanted stranger intruding on a family's grief or like a cat they kept tripping over - like she was just in the way.

She tried to help out, but she was rubbish in the kitchen. Household spells were something she was never going to be all that good at; really she was no better than a muggle when it came down to it. And then she had tried to be there for Ron, but her efforts were rebuffed. Hermione understood, grief did strange things to people, she'd read that somewhere. She couldn't be mad at him, even though it hurt. There was no purpose for her presence there. No reason for her to stay. So she made arrangements less than a week from when she'd arrived at the Burrow to go back to Hogwarts to help with the recovery effort. She didn't mind being an extra pair of hands. It was nice to be needed.

The real surprise was that Harry had followed not that long after. He was more welcome in that house than Hermione had _ever_ been. And he'd been doing a very good job of helping Ginny and the others deal with things. Despite the terrible way he'd been treated growing up, Harry was a surprisingly empathetic person. He had a way about him - a lightness that he brought that made you feel like the center of the universe.

She'd seen how he handled Ginny, the tender way he'd hold her like she was a delicate china teacup. How he'd quietly help Molly with preparing meals during the day or with cleaning, anticipating her needs without her ever having to verbalize it. She'd walked in on him talking to Ron or Fred on different occasions, impressed by how he helped them talk through their emotions. And when talking didn't work, they'd go in the backyard and hit bludgers at each other for a few hours. She didn't understand it, but it somehow worked.

He was good at all that, making people feel comfortable and important. She wasn't. Oh, she could carefully lay out all the reasons one might be glad that they were alive. Reasons for why you shouldn't feel guilty because you survived and someone else didn't. She had a million platitudes she could unload and a billion different inspirational quotes she'd memorized for just such occasions. But that wasn't comforting, not really.

None of the assurances she'd given Harry when he'd lost Sirius had helped much... time hadn't made the truth of it any less clear. Moreover, she didn't feel like she could say much that wasn't shallow and pitifully obvious. What right did she have telling anyone how to mourn - she hadn't really lost anything, not in the way Harry and the Weasleys had.

Harry could understand their grief in a way she never could. He was the one person on this earth that could help them process their loss. He belonged there. She didn't.

So when he showed up she had been very surprised indeed. He never said why he left and she didn't bother to ask. Perhaps he'd felt as out of place as she had or maybe he just wanted to help out. More than likely, he'd come out of a sense of obligation and that he felt he was somehow to blame for all this, that putting the dead to rest would somehow make up for it. Silly, really, but that was Harry.

The work was hard and sometimes downright miserable. Most of the bodies had been removed but every now and then when moving rubble, you'd find one or sometimes only a part of one. For those two weeks when she was by herself, she spent a lot of time crying alone in the makeshift tents set up for all the volunteers. Her sleep was uneasy and she'd taken to casting silencing charms, lest she wake others with her screaming.

When Harry came things were simultaneously harder and easier. Easier in that she had someone to share the pain with and harder because sweet, noble Harry felt as if he had to take on everyone else's burden. She hated the way his shoulders slumped when he thought no one was looking. Or the flat, faraway look he'd get in his eyes when talking to you. She did what she always did in those moments, explain to him clearly why he wasn't to blame (not that he ever listened) and when that failed she'd just hold him. He never cried. Never reciprocated the hugs she'd give him. He'd just go limp and bury his face in her shoulder with a soft sigh. Running her hands through his hair, it almost felt like she was doing more than just spinning her wheels.

And then she made a mistake or more correctly... several mistakes. Or perhaps the same mistake just made over and over again. To this day she wasn't really sure.

It had been a very hard day. They'd found what turned out to be the last of the missing: A fifth year Ravenclaw, or more correctly - parts of that fifth year Ravenclaw. Harry hadn't taken it well. To be frank, he was a mess. She found him back in the tent they now shared. He was hunched over on his bunk, head in hands. It was the first time she'd ever really seen him cry. As always, she held him but this time he held her back, a tight, grasping kind of embrace that bordered on desperation. It felt to her as if he was holding on to her to make sure he was real, that he was human.

When they broke away, they were a hair's breadth apart - just as they had before. She felt that same terrible pull she had so many months ago, her heart thrumming in her chest. But unlike last time, she didn't pull away and neither did he. Closer and closer they came, until their lips were barely brushing. And then they kissed hesitantly - becoming bolder and more heated with every press of their lips. It was everything she had imagined it would be and more. When they finally broke away, disheveled and shaking with desire, her brain finally started working again.

"We... w-we can't. That was..." she stammered as she stood up, her legs trembling so badly she wasn't sure they'd hold her.

He stood as well. She'd never realized how tall he was; shorter than Ron, but definitely taller than her. His eyes burned when he looked at her, his hand coming up to cup her cheek. "Why?" he whispered, his voice hoarse.

She couldn't tear her gaze away as she tried and failed to come up with a reason, any reason, to make him see what a mistake this was. "Well, b-because... we're n-n-not... I mean, you're with..."

"I don't care."

"But... H-Harry, it's not r-right. We have to think about this l-logically-"She was having trouble speaking, his hand had moved from her cheek and down her neck in a slow caress.

He took a step forward, and pulled her to him gently. With great deliberation, his kissed her again, more deeply. His hands kneaded her arms, slipping down to grasp her hips and pull her even closer. She offered no resistance, though on the inside she was screaming at herself. She'd been here before. She didn't want to be just a warm body but it was hard to concentrate on that with his mouth on her neck doing all sorts of wonderful things that felt very good. She could feel him shaking under her hands. No doubt he could feel her trembling too, trying to hold back. And then he delivered the coup de grace.

Two words.

"Hermione, please," he said in a pleading whisper, the rawness of his voice was heartbreaking.

She was undone.

Everything unraveled as he kissed her again, as their hands shakily explored the planes of their bodies. She gasped as he slowly pushed the straps of her tank top off her shoulder, taking her bra strap with it. Her hands trembling, she carefully lifted the edge of his shirt, peeling it off of him. With a perfunctory plop both their shirts were discarded on the floor, soon followed by her bra. They didn't stop touching each other, but there was a moment when they were both bare that they stopped to realize the momentousness of what they were doing. That thought, like their clothes, was discarded as they stumbled onto the mattress, legs tangled as they writhed against each other.

Their exploration was slow but frantic, as if they couldn't get enough. Harry, in particular, took his time even though it was obviously pushing the bounds of his control. He was so tender, so gentle, nearly overwhelming her body with his attention, as if he wasn't satisfied until she was near delirious with pleasure. When he finally took her, she nearly cried in relief. She wanted him inside her more than anything; everything else had been teasing torture. They lay there connected in the most intimate of ways for a number of seconds, breathing tremulously. His forehead pressed against hers. He kissed her cheeks, the corner of her mouth, her neck delicately before asking her quietly if she was okay. And when she gave him confirmation that she was ready, he slowly began to thrust.

There were moans and sighs as they found a rhythm. Her legs locked behind his back to push him deeper inside, arms around his neck as she gasped into his shoulder. He began to shudder; his breathing becoming labored as his thrusts came more quickly, pressing in more deeply. His breath caught as he spasmed jerkily several times, coming inside her with a low moan. Once he recovered, he helped her to completion with his hand. His fingers deep inside her, the other hand gently massaging her clit until her back arched and she let out a silent scream.

Nothing was said, they were both far too tired. They fell asleep together in his bed, naked as the day they were born. Sometime during the night they woke and made love two more times. The next morning was awkward, collecting their clothing from where it was tossed the night before. Neither of them really knew how to address what had happened, both too embarrassed to say anything. Hermione had assumed it was as a result of all the death they'd seen the last few days. They needed something life affirming, something that made them feel like the world wasn't entirely terrible. Harry probably felt the same.

And they could have left it at that, just a small mistake made in the heat of the moment. They were tired and heart sore, and this had been the easiest way to connect in the most profound way possible with another human being.

Except that it happened again. The very next night after their shift, they immediately went to his bed and made love with wild abandon. It happened the night after that and the night after that; ostensibly happening almost every night for nearly three weeks, stopping briefly when the Weasleys rejoined them in mid-June.

The rest of June and July was spent at the Burrow. At first, Harry and Hermione had been true to their unspoken oath when the Weasleys had come to get them. Whatever had happened in those few weeks had been a pleasant diversion and nothing more. It had been what they'd both needed then, but it was over now. Hermione had promised herself it was over. She'd done what she'd promised she wouldn't, became what she hadn't wanted to be. But it had ended. It would never happen again.

It did not help in the least with her feelings. Knowing what she could have was far worse than merely dreaming about it. She loved him. God, she loved him so much and it was almost too hard to hide it now. She was drowning in it.

He didn't help. When he'd pass her in the hall, his hand would lightly graze hers. Sometimes she'd see him gazing at her from across the dining room table, eyes glassy with desire. This all lead to dozens of stolen kisses and the occasional snog in a cupboard or closet, culminating in a number of midnight couplings in the shed on the outskirts of the Burrow. Did he love her or was she just there, like the summit of Mt. Everest? Gods above, she wanted to believe it was love that was causing whatever this was between them.

She had to either put a stop to it or find out why... why after all this time did he show a distinct interest in her - physically, at least? And was there more? _Please let there be more_.

After a particularly amorous bout of lovemaking one afternoon, she stopped him. She needed an answer, a real answer. "We can't keep doing this, Harry."

"I know," he murmured, looking more confused and lost than she'd ever seen him.

Licking her lips, she inhaled deeply. "I need to k-know... where this is all going... I need to know why."

"I don't understand..."

"Does this even mean anything... to... t-to you? Because it does to m-me or is it just..." she stuttered in an aching whisper. "I just... I want more... than this." She saw the way he stiffened and drew back from her, a horrified look of dawning realization on his face. Like he just worked out what a terrible mistake he'd made. Her face mirrored his. _This was a mistake... it's all a mistake_. "It's... It's probably best we just stop. Y-you have G-g-ginny and I h-have Ron and stopping is for the best and just... just forget I said anything." And then she fled like an enormous coward into the orchard near the Burrow. She found a good tree to rest underneath as far away as possible and then she cried and cried and cried.

Three hours later, she came back looking disheveled and obviously upset. She didn't talk to anyone and no one dared talk to her. Harry didn't even look at her. There was no need for further discussion, his feelings on the matter were clear.

The day after her disastrous confession he'd proposed to Ginny. It was July 2nd, a date that was burned indelibly into her memory like a ragged scorching scar. Her face was a mask, at first, when he announced it. She'd been swallowing bitter pills long enough that the shock and anguish she felt was easily papered over with something resembling real joy. Hugging Ginny, she whispered her congratulations. She grasped Harry's hand and said much the same, her eyes didn't quite meet his, but that was okay.

It was all for the best.

* * *

After so much sorrow, having something to celebrate was welcome to most everyone else. Hermione smiled and laughed and pretended to be happy so well that no one noticed she was dying inside. Someone joked that she and Ron ought to be next and she nearly choked on her butterbeer. She expected much the same reaction from Ron. He only blushed a bit, giving her a hopeful little grin before politely answering, "We'll see."

The guilt was so all encompassing that there was no hole on earth big enough to bury herself in.

That night once everyone was safe in their beds, Hermione had a very quiet emotional breakdown. Her whole life was unraveling before her. She'd had everything planned out before all this. Everything had been meticulously mapped out from how long she and Ron ought to date before marrying to various career milestones she wished to reach, right down to when they'd have kids together and how many. Oh, it was all so simple back then. Before she'd realized she couldn't do it anymore... she couldn't swallow those bitter pills anymore and pretend they were sweet, because they fucking weren't.

And all those grand plans abruptly fell apart like a cheap papier mache sculpture in the rain -she wasn't the same person any more. It was nothing more than pointless bullshit written by a naïve little girl with no idea at all how the real world worked. A girl who thought she was so damned clever that she had it all figured out.

Staring up at plain white washed ceiling in Ginny's bedroom, she remembered a New Year's Eve a few years ago when her mother, Helen Granger - née Hélène Didier, had gotten very drunk and related the facts of life to her at the kitchen counter at two in the morning.

"When I was your age, I faced a very tough choice," she'd slurred, her French accent more prominent than normal due to her inebriation. "I wanted to be an artist, did you know? But n'était pas réaliste. Mon père a dit… he say that he wouldn't pay to send me to art school. It was my dream but he told me that dreams don't pay the bills… that I have to be realistic. That dreams are for des enfants... "

Her father had given her an ultimatum. If she did what was expected of her, he would pay for her education fully or she could do as she pleased and be cut off entirely - effectively disowning her. He had stressed that now that she was an adult it was her choice and whatever choice she made would be final in his eyes. Helen Didier had never been a rebel, no matter how hard she'd dreamt about it.

She decided to go to England and study at Queen Mary College to become a dentist, like her father. A very safe choice her parents were glad to encourage. She met her husband a year after she enrolled. Richard Granger was a quiet, respectable boy that her parents approved of. Helen settled, because she was afraid. It was the path of least resistance. The path that was safer with less worry. They'd have her parents support. They wouldn't have to struggle. But she'd always regretted that choice. She always wondered what might have been if she'd chosen differently - if she'd taken the path less traveled.

Her eyes trailing a small crack in the ceiling, Hermione was reminded of this confession and confronted with this very same choice. The safe path... the easy choice, the stupid plan with all its little bullet points and highlighted bits that were so damned important to her once upon a time - go back to Hogwarts, get your NEWTS, get a job at the ministry, marry your school girl crush (who was your second choice but you can't always get what you want, can you? - it wasn't fair to Ron, but life wasn't fair either), have a passel of happy little children with bright red hair and then what... Is that what she wanted? She didn't know anymore. Or did she choose the hard path... what path would that even be? It couldn't possibly involve Harry, he'd made his choice. If there was a path it wasn't just less traveled, it was one that hadn't even been discovered yet.

Ron deserved better than her. They all did, really.

She wanted to crawl out of her own skin. To close her eyes and just stop existing for a single moment so maybe she could figure out what the hell she wanted. Whatever it was, she knew it wasn't _this_. All this anguish and guilt and uncertainty - she couldn't take it anymore. She was dimly aware that she might be having some kind of mental breakdown. She was too tired and too numb to care.

Her one and only thought that night as she fell asleep was that she needed to be away - far, far away - like some kind of wounded animal retreating into its burrow. Not _the_ Burrow... her own burrow; a place where she could lick her wounds for a bit and figure out a new plan.

The next morning everyone was still glowing from the good news of Ginny and Harry's impending happy ending. She mentioned casually about going to Australia to get her parents. Ron had begun to open his mouth, and it was the first thing she could think of to close it. The air had been sucked out of the room.

"Are you sure, dear?" Molly asked carefully, scrutinizing her in that way made Hermione feel distinctly guilty.

"Yes, I'm sure. The longer I wait, the harder it'll be to reverse the memory charms," she'd replied briskly, trying to very hard to pretend like she actually had it together like always.

And then Harry, damn him, said, "That's great! We could go with you, right Ron?"

"Yeah, that'd be brilliant! It'd be like a vacation."

"Oh, no, that's all right. This is really something I should do myself-"

"Nonsense," Molly interrupted with a motherly wave of her hand. "It'll be safer if you don't go alone. When were you thinking of leaving?"

"Well, I wasn't really sure... um, as soon as possible, I suppose."

"We could do it at the end of the week," Ginny suggested eagerly. "It'd give us time to plan a quick going away party!"

And it rolled out of her control from that point forward. The date they were to leave was altered from Friday to next week Wednesday, to allow for a party, of course. Then there was a changing list of who was going, finally locked down to just the kids - Harry and Ginny, Ron and Hermione. A cute little couples vacation. And they'd be back before Harry's birthday!

Hermione wanted to throw up, metaphorically and literally. She wanted... no, she needed time to be alone. What was Harry even playing at? They'd all go on this sweet little vacation and pretend nothing happened? Is that what he thought? Or was he clumsily trying to make things up to her? As if playing nice and retrieving her parents was enough to erase the fact that he was repulsed by the idea of being with her as more than a friend for longer than a midnight shag in a shed. And here they all were, planning things for her... just... she couldn't do this.

She wasn't called the Brightest Witch of Her Age for nothing. This was the same girl who'd put together everything for their Horcrux hunt right underneath Molly Weasley's ever watchful eye. She'd made one of the most complicated potions one could make at age 13 in a bathroom. She'd blackmailed a Daily Prophet reporter into silence and then convinced that same reporter to write an article for free the very next year. She'd started an illegal defense club, charmed coins to communicate with that club's members and put a complicated curse on the parchment they'd all signed their names to.

And let's not forget the memory charms she'd performed.

Well, she'd done more than just do simple memory charms on her parents. Not that she'd ever told the boys that much, it was a waste of breath and time as they never listened to her anyway. What she hadn't told them was that she'd manufactured a whole lifetime for her parents out of thin air. Not just memories (which was complicated in of itself), but an entire paper trail - birth certificates and passports, medical records, university diplomas, all the little pieces of paper that made up a person's life, she'd conjured it up whole cloth- and they were all 100% real and un-clockable by even the most diligent of governmental officials.

The spells she'd cast to remove and replace their memories were based on the heavily regulated memory charms used by licensed Oblviators. But those spells used by Ministry officials were extremely limited in her opinion, so she went about taking what she'd learned from her books and applying it in a new way. She'd always fancied creating her own spells anyway. It was supposed to be difficult. Hermione had found it almost insultingly easy.

There was more... she hadn't sent her parents to Australia. She'd sent them to New Zealand instead. And she had lied to Ron and Harry in the event that they got captured. Deatheaters would follow the other trail she'd made that led to Pine Gap, a governmental satellite tracking station in Alice Springs, where they would find that Monica and Wendell Wilkins existed only on paper. Well, that or they'd run afoul of the Australian Ministry.

Meanwhile, her parents were safely in New Zealand living in Christchurch as Bettina and William Robards. They were a childless English couple looking to get away from noisy old London for much quieter pastures. William was a dentist, this gambit was a bit dangerous as it could connect him to his real identity, but her father had loved being a dentist and tying the charm to his real memories made it more stable and harder to crack if someone tried to cast a counter-charm.

William also liked to sail and hike in his free time, and had a priceless collection of demitasse cups, while Bettina owned her own gallery, called the Fleur-de-lis, in the ritzy part of town where she sold her paintings alongside a myriad of other local artists. Hermione had tied these memories to her mother's own experience as an amateur artist and the dreams she spoke of that long ago New Year's night where she'd admitted her regrets. In _he_r spare time, Bettina cultivated orchids and went hiking with her gallant and adventurous husband.

Hermione had done all of that. And if she could do it once, she could do it again easily.

It took her less than a day to manufacture the proper paperwork.

She walked out of the Burrow at three in the morning on July 7th before their little going away party, leaving behind a note on her bed explaining where she was (but not really) and why she'd left (a pack of lies), and then she apparated to London once she was clear of the Burrow's wards. From there she showed up and put in an International Portkey request for Melbourne. She took it, of course, to establish a false trail and then port-keyed to Leeds illegally two hours later. She chose Leeds because people would assume, _if _they thought about it, that she'd go back to London, being more she was familiar with that city.

Wizards hardly ever thought to check muggle means of travel. So from Leeds, she booked a one way ticket to Australia with a stop in Athens, choosing an airport in Brisbane rather than Melbourne, and then she booked another flight to Christchurch, arriving two days later. The moment she landed in Athens would be the last time Hermione Granger existed on paper or otherwise. By the time she'd gotten to New Zealand, it was as if she'd died and a new person was born from the ashes.

For the first day and a half in Christchurch, she just sort of wandered around, making sure to steer clear of any areas where wizards congregated as it wouldn't do to be spotted so quickly. She booked a small bed and breakfast in a muggle area, using an alias. It gave her time to breathe, time to cry, and time to grieve without anyone policing her.

She didn't have to be Hermione Granger here. She honestly didn't realize how exhausting it was. There were no expectations, no heavy looks or awkward silences. She didn't have to school her face to look like she wasn't bothered by how her life was going. She didn't have to pretend like she had it all together - to stay strong as she always had to hold everyone else up. They had all looked at her like they always did when things got tough; after all, didn't Hermione Granger always have the answer they needed? This time she honestly didn't. There was no bemused exasperation followed by an eye roll as she explained the obvious to them all. She'd failed entirely for the first time in her life. It was as terrifying as she'd always imagined.

Coming here had begun the long, painful process of divesting herself of all those expectations. There was no one but herself to answer to now. She could quietly rifle through her mental baggage without taking on anyone else's, for the first time in almost seven years. But the thing that gave her the most solace was that she was away from Harry - away from _that_ confusing bundle of emotions and all the guilt that entailed, and with enough time to get over the heartbreak.

She still loved him and she wasn't angry with him. But she needed to be away. To remember who she was and what she stood for without him. Besides, she thought she might die having to watch him with Ginny. She didn't for a moment judge him for following his heart, but she had to follow hers right now. You can't choose who you love and because she loved him, she'd give him what would make him happy. She knew Ginny would, but right now she couldn't be a part of it. Not after everything they'd shared. It didn't mean anything to him, but it was the world to her and there was no easy way to get over that.

More than anything, she had wanted to talk to her mother. If there was one person in her life that she could count on to sort out such a confusing situation, it was Helen Granger. So on the third day, she finally sought her out... she was talking to her mother and just about ready to give the trigger phrase that'd break the memory charm. They were talking about Van Gogh. He was always her mother's favorite. She watched her mother becoming effusive as she talked about color choices and the passion of his brushwork, and how it influenced her style.

Staring at a lovely painting of yellow camellias her mother had painted (which she later bought) and... she couldn't do it. The sparkle in her eye, the rosiness of her cheeks, her mother was _happy _as Bettina Robards. And in that moment, Hermione had an awful epiphany.

What would she have if she became Helen Granger once more?

Mother of Hermione Granger; constantly worried about her daughter's safety and forever left behind because Hermione was just too busy being the Brightest Witch of Her Age. Hermione could selfishly give back the memories she'd taken away, all so she could sort out all her silly little problems. It would be easy.

What wasn't easy was the realization she'd given her mother a real chance to live her dream - to have the kind of life she'd given up to become a mother of an ungrateful child who'd left her behind for a world that hardly appreciated her. For the life of her, Hermione could not take away the chance for her mother to live the life she'd always dreamed of.

Dreams were hard to come by and dreams that came true were even rarer.

Numbly walking out of her mother's gallery, painting under her arm, she left her parents behind. It'd be safer for them. She nodded as if agreeing with a question no one had asked, eyes staring forward blankly as she processed her thoughts. Being her parents was dangerous. It'd be better for them. They could both have the life they'd wanted before their strange and off-putting daughter had been born. The daughter who'd lied to them. The daughter who'd used magic on them without even asking them beforehand - who'd stolen their memories and placated her guilt by telling herself over and over again that it was all to keep them safe.

'_It was better this way_', she told herself as she wept, putting one foot firmly in front of the other and not looking back. Once that was decided, she thought long and hard about what she'd do next. She didn't want to go back, not yet.

_Maybe not ever._

* * *

_Quand on se quitte_

_On n'oublie tout_

_Mais revenir est si doux_

_Si ma tristesse_

_Peut t'émouvoir_

_Avec tendresse_

_Reviens un soir_

_Et dans tes bras_

_Tout renaîtra_

_J'attrendrai_


	2. Chapter 2

For reasons that were beyond her, she went to Christchurch Cathedral. She wasn't even Anglican but to some part of her brain it had made sense. Looking up at the delicate stained glass of the Cathedral's rose window, she had formed a loose plan. It had been easy enough creating a few aliases while she was here. Creating a more permanent one would be a challenge but nothing that would be all that taxing, when she got right down to it.

Her mother was French by birth and by virtue of being born in Paris, she held dual citizenship.

In the Fall of 1979, her grandfather had stage four lung cancer. All those years of near constant smoking had finally caught up with him in the end. Helen and Richard had come over immediately for a visit. He hadn't wanted to die in hospital, so he had set himself up in their family home in Paris. Because her mother and all her aunts were all elderly as well, Helen had taken it upon herself as the youngest and healthiest relative to become his main caregiver, despite the fact that she was nearly to term. She'd basically lived in Paris for the last two months of her pregnancy. Richard visited occasionally, but had to stay in London to keep their practice afloat.

Helen's father, Levi, had been unimaginably grateful for his daughter's devotion, though he often apologized to her for taking her away from her home and her husband. All the same, he was happy she was here. Despite the fact that he didn't have long to live, he'd very much wanted to see the birth of his first and only grandchild. Hermione remembered the stories her mother told of how he'd talked to his future grandchild, hand on her mother's stomach. How he'd exhorted Hermione to come out as soon as she could because the whole family couldn't wait to meet her. Two days later after her grandfather's whispered request, she was born on a rainy Paris night in the Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, the very same hospital that had diagnosed her grandfather. The old man had gotten to hold her before he passed away a mere week later, quietly in his home.

This would be the basis for her new identity. It'd be easy enough to doctor her own records with magic and manufacture those she was missing. She had the money from her muggle bank account, which was comfortable enough even after all the plane tickets she'd bought. So she had enough to live on for the moment. She had a plan. She had all the relevant documentation she'd need or she would soon. It was crazy. It was reckless. It was the exact opposite of something Hermione Granger would have done, at least without any outside prompting.

And nothing and no one was stopping her.

So Hermione Jean Granger became Emma Agnès Didier, taking her middle name from her maternal grandmother and her paternal grandmother's given name. Emma left New Zealand on a one way flight to Thailand and from there she did a whole bunch of island hopping, using a combination of airplane travel and apparition until she arrived in the Philippines. Once she'd arrived in Luzon, she booked another short flight Seoul. From there she apparated to Tokyo and from there she flew to Germany, before returning to Paris. All in all, it took a little over three days, still well within the two week limit she'd given everyone for retrieving her parents.

It was easy enough to establish herself once in the French Capital. Her paperwork for citizenship was already altered and filed magically. All she had to do was go to a government office and officially claim citizenship, making it easier for her to find gainful employment as soon as possible. Then she got a bank account. Once she had that, she found a place to live - a small flat in the 19th Arrondissement.

She'd found an ad in Le Parisien giving the address of local bookstore in the Marais, Les Mots à La Bouche. The young man working the desk was the one who'd posted it. He was looking for someone to help with the rent as his old roommate was moving back to Spain in two days. And he needed someone immediately, as he couldn't afford the rent on his own and since the former roommate had left with little notice, he was in a tight spot. He'd looked almost as relieved as she felt when she'd come in asking about the offer. He'd agreed almost immediately.

Her new roommate's name was Émile Broussard. He was a student at the University of Paris (or Paris 8 as it was sometimes referred to) studying philosophy with a minor in business. His father was the no account son of a prominent French family and his mother was a highly educated woman of mixed French-Egyptian ancestry. He'd told her that his mother worked for the Louvre for fun, as she had more money than god. She helped him with his few university bills but expected that he pay for his own flat, hence the need for a roommate. He was also gay, a fact that he pointedly mentioned when they first met, gauging her reaction.

Her only worry was the kind of concern that she'd have with any flat-mate - that they'd bring loads of dates home. She told him all this honestly, indicating she didn't give a damn who he slept with so long as he was a respectful roommate.

"The same goes for you, Madame," he declared cheekily.

"Mademoiselle," she corrected dryly. "I'm only 18."

"Well, you don't have to worry about boyfriends. I rarely bring them home but if you're worried we can work out a system," he replied more seriously.

"I don't plan on bringing anyone home either," she said absently with a small bit of sadness.

"Bad break up?"

She smiled tightly. "You could say that."

"Looks like we're in the same boat, then." And then he smiled sadly. "The only good that came of it is I've learned that you should never move in with a lover you've known for less than a year. It always ends in tears and broken crockery," he said with a rather weary eye-roll. "We'll try it for a week. How does that sound?"

"Perfect," she agreed and they shook on it.

The apartment was small but comfortable in a quiet immigrant neighborhood. There was something like a foyer where all their shoes went, Émile had more than she did - most of them were high heels. There was a small door just off the foyer that led to the bathroom/laundry room. The other door led to the combined dining/kitchen/living room area. There were two bedrooms that were conjoined, in order to get to the larger bedroom one had to walk through the smaller one. Emma's was the smaller bedroom.

In that first week in mid-July she learned a lot of things. First and foremost was that Émile's ex-boyfriend had been a drag queen who had performed as Madame Nichons Frise in a club located in the Marais. He'd left all his shoes, hence why there was an overflowing pile of women's high heels near the door. Émile apologized profusely for the mess.

"I don't know why he left them all. It's not as if I have any use for them," Émile complained, absently kicking a stray shoe. "He probably expects me to send them to him." He glowered at the shoes, turning to regard her for a moment. "If any of them fit you, feel free to take them. Frankly, giving his shit away is payment for everything I've put up with from that boy."

Hermione laughed loudly. It was the first time she'd done so in what seemed like ages.

Beyond that, the most important thing she found out was that they had a lot in common. They loved books, he had stuffed an entire library in their teeny apartment and she was dutifully impressed, not just by the sheer amount but the general quality. They both found learning new things fun and didn't understand why some people abhorred studying. They both thought Sartre was somewhat overrated as a philosopher and they both absolutely hated most anything by Charles Dickens. His writing was overworked and pedantic. They both agreed Victor Hugo had his moments but that Les Miserables was an absolute bore, regardless of whether or not it was put to music. And both of them absolutely loathed Jim Morrison and had spent an entire afternoon at Père-Lachaise Cemetery giving wrong directions to Morrison's grave to overeager Doors fans.

All in all, it was like she'd discovered she had a long lost brother in France.

It was an equitable relationship for the most part. By then they'd talked a bit about her lives, he more than her. She was vague and left a lot of detail out, because there was a part of her that was intensely worried she'd be discovered. And there were things she just didn't want to talk about, if she was being frank. Emma hadn't dared looked for a copy of the Prophet, much less whatever newspaper the magical world in France had (she had no idea). It had been well over a month since she'd left. The two weeks or so she'd scheduled for getting her parents had firmly expired.

They would be looking for her soon, if they hadn't started already.

Others might have been blind to her obfuscation, but Émile was not. He recognized a lost soul when he saw one. Oh, he knew about secrets and how hard it was to hold onto them. There was always a part of you that yearned to be free, to lay those secrets out in the open, but prying at this point would do more harm than good. She'd tell him in good time. While he waited for her to come clean, he dragged her out of the apartment, which she huddled in like some kind of fugitive.

Whoever had broken her heart had nearly broken her completely that much was obvious. She needed to get out, have fun like a normal person her age and forget the connard that had hurt her so terribly. And it wasn't as if he wasn't getting something out of it. Helping her helped him work through his own horrible breakup. Here was a problem he could solve. Unlike the problems he and Serge had had, which had turned out to be insurmountable. Besides, she was a dreadfully good listener.

The first step was a job. From his own job at Les Mots à La Bouche, he knew the manager at Shakespeare & Company. Both bookstores had sent customers back and forth over the years when looking for certain volumes one store had and the other didn't. Plus it helped that he'd worked at Shakespeare & Co. before he'd gotten the job at Les Mots à La Bouche. It was easy enough to inquire if they had an opening and then make a quick suggestion for someone who could fill the spot. Just like that, he'd gotten her a job. One he knew she'd be good at.

Then he'd helped her with her university application. She'd decided to go to Paris 8 with him to study art history and painting. Having income was all well and good, but having something to work towards was better. In as much pain as she was, she couldn't see what her future might look like. She was smart, that was obvious. She was the kind of person who planned things... the kind of person who fell apart when all those plans turned to dust. So after badgering her a bit, he figured that going to university wasn't a bad option for her. It might even help her figure out what she wanted to do. It was clear that kind of environment was where she felt most comfortable, anyway.

Finally, he took her to a drag show, and introduced her to his friends at the club. And ever so slowly, she opened up bit by bit and he could see the marvelous wit and the absolutely beautiful personality underneath all that sadness.

Everything was going swimmingly for Emma. She had new friends. She was in school. She had an apartment and a job. Things were looking up. But around her actual birthday in mid-September, she began to feel sick. She was tired much of the time and her back ached for no reason. Émile encouraged her to go to a doctor, but her national insurance coverage hadn't been processed yet because French bureaucracy was horribly slow, so she stubbornly refused. It wasn't until she passed out at work that he forced her to go see a doctor, insisting on covering any bills.

She'd gone by herself that day, because it was just too embarrassing to go with your new guy friend. Anyway, he had class and she certainly wasn't going to make him miss anything because she had a little sniffle. She didn't know why Émile was so worried. The day she'd passed out she hadn't eaten much. In the last month or so she'd noted she'd gained a bit of weight, most likely due to all the depression eating she'd been doing. So she had cut back a bit on snacks and meals and sometimes she just clean forgot, being so focused on her studies as she was. In point of fact, she'd been busy studying for an exam she had at the end of the week and she'd just overextended herself. Besides, she'd been a bit sick with the flu or some kind of cold for the past few weeks. It was a whole lot of nothing.

Then the doctor asked a very worrying question. When was your last period? Emma couldn't honestly remember. She'd always been a bit irregular. So she had her take a test. In her entire life, she had never failed a test. Her record remained unbroken that day, much to her chagrin.

Émile found her several hours later, weeping as quietly as possible into her pillow. He made the simple mistake of asking her what was wrong. All her secrets came spilling out. The biggest one being that she was around four months pregnant, give or take. She told him about falling in love with her best friend and how they'd slept together. Told him how he'd proposed to another woman after they'd broken things off. How she didn't even know who she was anymore. She babbled on about the nightmares and how she could hardly shut her eyes at night, because it was all blood and smoke and screaming. About how it was like her entire life was one big crumbling ruin that was maybe on fire and how everything hurt.

And then she told him who she really was. That Emma Didier was made up and that she was _really_ Hermione Granger, a member of what the wizarding press were now calling 'the Golden Trio' who'd just saved the wizarding world. And then she summoned her Patronus like a fool in front of someone she was sure was a muggle, no less. She was so distraught that it barely registered that its form had changed drastically.

"Well that simplifies things," Émile commented as he blandly watched her Patronus trot serenely through his kitchen before walking into his room and returning with wand in hand, spinning it between his fingertips.

"You're a wizard?"

He nodded, asking her curiously, "You're really Hermione Granger? _That_ Hermione Granger - the one they're looking for?"

"Yes, I'm her," she replied tiredly. She buried her face in her hands, wiping away the tears and shuddering. "What a bloody mess..."

He held up a copy of '_La Vie Quotidienne en Paris'_ the French equivalent of '_The Daily Prophet' _and compared it to the weeping girl sitting on his futon. Dismissing the puffy eyes and overall miserableness of her appearance, there was no doubt Emma Didier and Hermione Granger were one and the same.

"Damn. Damn. Damn. DAMN," she shouted, her voice rising with each damn and then she began to cry again. She angrily tossed her wand across the room, dully satisfied with the thud it made as it hit the wall. "Wuh-w-why d-does everyt-thing h-have to go to sh-hit?"

"I'm not going to tell anyone unless you want me to, you know," he informed her, looking at her fallen wand in a detached kind of way.

"Don't be so sure. You haven't seen what they're offering for information that might lead to my whereabouts," she snapped tartly, tossing her copy of the Daily Prophet at him that had more up to date information.

On the front page was a huge photo of her with an offer for an absolutely insane amount of Galleons for her safe return. She wondered dimly if Harry had put up the money. He probably did, the big idiot. Why couldn't he just leave well enough alone?

"I don't give a damn about the money," Émile scoffed, slapping down the paper in pure disgust. "I _have _money. The only question that's relevant is what you want to do now? Go back or stay here."

The answer was obvious. She felt like a traitor - a selfish, thoughtless git who abandoned her friends, and she hated the idea that she was making everyone worry, putting them in such an awful place during an already dreadful time. But staying here was what she needed now. For the sake of retaining some semblance of sanity she just couldn't go back. Her decision was further strengthened by the headlines in yesterday's Prophet... someone had leaked the news that Harry was officially affianced.

The happy couple had confirmed it with a joint interview, one that Harry really hadn't wanted to give. Even in print form she could tell when he was uncomfortable with something. His answers were terse and few and far between. Unlike Ginny, who went on at length about their nuptials and whose tone was enthusiastic, to say the least. She'd had her colors picked out forever ago, according to the article. And she was getting a wedding dress designed by the lead designer at Twilfitt and Tattings. They were, to quote from the article, sparing no expense.

Worse, a date had been set for the Marriage of the Century, as they Prophet's headline had blazed. The 26th of June, a summer wedding to be held in the Burrow. She looked at the picture accompanying the story... a lovely shot of both Ginny and Harry, holding hands and smiling shyly. They looked so happy and sweet... so wholesome. Just a normal couple getting married, despite all the fuss the press was making. It was clear they were in love. Moreover, it was also clear that the wizarding press loved them. It was like a royal bloody wedding. (She noted dully that the articles about her disappearance had been pushed nearly to the back page, which should have been a relief.)

'_He's happy, that's all that matters_,' she told herself as she forced tears back.

In a very small voice, she made her decision. "I want to stay."

"Okay," said Émile with a nod. "What about the baby... will you tell the father?"

She thought about it for a long moment. A part of her was desperate to tell him. He was the father of her child, and had every right to have a place in that child's life, and he'd always wanted a family. But she couldn't help but think about what would happen if she _did_ go back to England. He'd announced his engagement. He and Ginny were to be married. And what would happen if she waltzed back into their lives with a happy little announcement of her own?

'_It'd ruin everything_,' she thought.

For Harry, she knew very well he considered the Weasleys as close to a real family as he'd ever have. Perhaps if Sirius or Remus had survived the war, it'd be different. But the fact was... the Weasleys were his world now. His family.

They were all that he had.

What could Hermione give him, really? He didn't know her parents - they were muggles and why would he bother with them when he had the Weasleys. They had been his first contact with the wizarding world. How could a pair of dentists compare to that? Besides, it wasn't like her parents were even in the picture at this point. They were still in New Zealand. And Ron was his first real friend. Being honest with herself, she'd never been sure of her friendship with Harry. She always got the impression that both he and Ron didn't much like spending time with her. But she was clever... it was the only thing she'd ever had. Her cleverness was useful during the war, but what purpose did it serve once the war was over - it served no purpose. No purpose at all.

So, she could choose to go back and tell him. And he'd probably do the noble thing, the stupid thing, and stand up for her to support his child. He'd break it off with Ginny and that'd be it for him. As much as Molly and Arthur and the rest loved Harry, he wasn't their child or their sibling, Ginny was. They'd support her in her time of need and Harry would be without the only family he'd ever known. No... Hermione couldn't do that to him.

"Harry-" she began, realizing her error in identifying the child's father but forging forward anyway. "He hasn't had an easy life. H-he's... he deserves to be h-happy, even if it's not with me. This would just complicate things for him. If I t-told him, he'd give up everything even though... h-he doesn't l-love me. I couldn't do that to him, especially now. It's... it's better if he doesn't know."

Émile wasn't so sure, but in the end it wasn't his decision. "Are you going to keep it?"

"It'd be selfish if I said yes," she muttered quietly, her hand unconsciously touching the slight curve her stomach. There was only a small bump, but it wouldn't be much longer...

"But you want it, don't you? You _want_ to keep it?"

"Yes," she whispered, her breath hitching. "Does that make me a terrible person?"

"No."

"What am I going to do?" She burst into fresh tears.

The next few days Émile helped her figure out a way forward. First things first, he had one of his friends contact their sister, who was a stylist, to cut and color her hair. She was far too recognizable with that bushy mop of hers. His friend's sister gave her a neat bob and plucked her equally bushy eyebrows. She also decided to dye Emma's hair a warm honey blonde. But she didn't stop there, gang-pressing her into learning how to do her own makeup. The lessons were brutal and unforgiving, but it made a huge difference. One would be hard pressed to see the almost matronly Hermione Granger in Emma Didier.

Then Émile enlisted his mother, who was weirdly delighted by the whole situation.

Frankly, Madame Broussard and Émile had their fill of the wizarding world when Beauxbatons had thrown her son out for being who true to who he was. Yes, he'd been caught in flagrante delicto with another student but she quite doubted they would have made such a fuss if the person he'd been fucking was female. As a muggle-born witch herself, she understood the way of the world, wizarding or otherwise. It wasn't just _who_ he'd been fucking, but the fact that he was a half-blood - a half-blood born of a mudblooded bitch that had the gall to divorce her incurably unfaithful pureblood husband.

Had he not been the son of a mudblood, his indiscretion would have been quickly forgiven because his father's name still carried weight, even if the man himself was a reprehensible piece of shit. But because her son was a half-blood and he was gay, they had quietly suggested he find another school to take him in, threatening expulsion while citing some arcane student morality clause in their charter. It was the worst kind of bureaucratic horseshit.

She hadn't been able to do much for him at the time, but this girl... she could help.

Nathalie understood very well how hard it was for muggleborns. And she understood the terrible pressure the spotlight could put on a person better than most. Having married a rich pureblood from a prominent family at 19, she had suffered the limelight for nearly 30 years. It was designed to break people, especially those, like Emma, who had dared to reach for more than what society would allow.

Her son had vouched for this girl, and, having met her, Nathalie had found her worthy of mentorship. She was smart and ambitious, traits the wizarding world didn't often value if one was muggleborn. They much preferred them to be quiet and compliant. Emma was young, and her heart had taken a bit of a beating. She would need an advocate... someone who wasn't afraid of much of anything, a role Nathalie could fill easily.

And in this role, she'd be able to give Emma a cover story, attaching her to a prestigious French family with many influential connections. Nathalie had worked hard to get where she was and was more than willing to share her good fortune. Emma would become like a daughter to her. There was no question this is how it would be because there few who would say no to Nathalie Broussard. The only ones who'd managed to do so had only succeeded because at the time they had power she did not. Things had changed since then. She'd move the world if she had to.

So she gladly took Emma out on a shopping trip, bolstering the girl's wardrobe with plenty of things for what fit her now and what would fit her later. Hermione Granger was a frumpy old maid, as far as Nathalie was concerned. And Madame Broussard would not tolerate a daughter of hers wearing terrible, ill-fitting clothes that looked like they'd been bought at some charity shop. The English had no sense of style at all. Her Emma would be the epitome of the put together Parisian woman. She didn't forget her adoptive grandchild, buying an expensive looking oak crib with matching changing table, which barely fit in their tiny apartment. Not to mention the scads of books, toys, and clothing she'd purchased for her future grandchild.

This was, of course, not the end. Nathalie Broussard never did anything by halves.

When she said Emma would be her daughter, she wasn't kidding. She had the stones and the connections to pull a few strings and within hours, Emma had legally become her daughter in law. A fact that she'd mentioned to both Emma and Émile as if she hadn't gone completely overboard. Nothing would change her mind. Emma would henceforth be Emma Didier-Broussard. Personally, Emma had thought the move terribly presumptuous but hadn't argued. Mostly because it meant she was more effectively hidden and she only had to stay "married" for two years. Plus, she'd be helping Émile out as well. His father's family was playing games with his inheritance.

Cyprien Broussard had died four years ago in an apparent car accident. The stupid fool had taken a liking to automobiles when he was still married to Nathalie. The only problem with this was that he didn't know how to drive all that well. One August evening, Cyprien had taken out his newly restored 1966 Citroën DS21 for a spin in the French Alps with his latest rented arm candy. He was drunk, as he almost always had been, and managed to drive through a guardrail. Unfortunately for him, the guardrail in question was attached to a very steep cliff, which the car had rocketed through at 150 km/h.

Cyprien was the heir to a vast fortune built up by his ancestors, which he and his family had depended on for years. The legacy of the Broussard family was the broom manufacturing company his great-great-grandfather had founded, Balais de Broussard pour le sorcier sportif. His grandfather and father had fostered that company until it had become wildly successful. It had been the premier professional racing broom-making company in Europe, until the upstart Nimbus Racing Broom Company had taken over the market in 1967.

Ever since then, Broussard Brooms had suffered something of a slowdown in production, though it was still a profitable company. No thanks to Cyprien, who'd handed over the reins to one of his father's friends in the 70s. He stayed on as a shareholder in name only, as he wasn't bright enough to understand half of the things they said at the few meetings he'd attended. Still, he had more money than most, even with his flagrant, pointless spending sprees.

At his death, he had conditionally bequeathed Émile a modest sum of money in his will, along with his titles and a few properties. According to the will, he was required to "give up his current lifestyle" if he was to inherent anything. His father's relatives were rather insistent about upholding it. The French Ministry of Magic was far more progressive than the one in the UK, but there were still pockets of influence that allowed pureblood nobility to get away with certain things. When it came to titles, land, and certain herilooms, the law was clear - they all went to the presumptive heir baring any conditions set forth in the will left behind. Meaning, Émile could lose his title and his share in Broussard Brooms if he did not conform to the will's stipulation.

Nathalie was sure she'd be able to challenge it in court. After all, even in the wizarding world, the nobility had been abolished in France. They could challenge the will in court, and Nathalie was sure they'd probably win if they did. However, it would be a long and arduous process, not to mention how expensive it would be. She hadn't honestly looked forward to it.

With Emma's appearance in their lives, there was a chance for them to claim what was due with little effort on their part. Nathalie had negotiated with them - if Émile married Emma and stayed married to her for two whole years, he'd receive the money, his seat on the board of directors for Broussard Brooms, and the titles at the end of those two years, no questions asked. She'd given up the properties, which had pleased Cyprien's greedy older sister who had her eyes on the mansion in Monaco Cyprien had left to his son (which Nathalie knew was a colossal money sink).

They'd drawn up the contract, signed it, and sent it off to the French Ministry. Of course, none of those idiots had known that the minute the terms of his inheritance were fulfilled they'd get an immediate divorce. Not one of them had thought to add a clause preventing it, and Nathalie and her lawyers didn't bother to mention it. She had never credited any of the Broussards with an abundance of brains and had anticipated their easy acceptance of her terms.

So only on paper, she was Émile's wife, in the wizarding world anyway. As for her child... They all agreed that she'd have the baby in a muggle hospital and line that named the father of her child on the birth certificate there would be left intentionally blank. Émile had insisted she do it this way, in the event that the father wanted to claim the child. Her new friend was unlike her old friends. He did not argue with her loudly or insistently. Instead, Émile was quietly firm in his decision that he not be listed as the baby's father, despite the protection it might bring.

"I understand this is your decision... but the child is still half his," he'd explained calmly, holding her hands as he did so. "Someday you may want to tell him. And if you _do _decide tell him, there's a good chance he'll want an opportunity to be a father to that child. If you do this, put me down as the father of your child, you close all the loopholes... you'll be leaving him no choice at all."

Emma relented and luckily Nathalie had agreed on this point. But she hadn't really stopped her relentless meddling. Why would she? From the moment Nathalie had concocted this scheme, she had been a veritable whirlwind. Going above and beyond her duty in a way Emma could admire, even though it was a bit annoying.

Being the Managing Director of the Louvre, she'd secured Emma a job with the prestigious museum. It wasn't much, just a part time secretarial job in the Research & Restoration Department, but it paid better than her job at the bookstore. Madame Broussard felt it was important that she had an in to a job that would lead her somewhere. With a degree from Paris 8, it'd be easy for her to push for Emma into an appropriate position of her choice once the time came. She had the proper connections that would allow Emma to receive any training and the degrees she'd need afterwards as well.

This was all done for the same reason she'd supported her son in his education and his life. Whatever he chose, she wanted him to have the tools available to get him there. Emma would be the daughter of her heart and she wanted her to succeed with the same passion she felt for her son. The wizarding world had denied them as far as she was concerned. Madame Broussard would not fail them in the same fashion.

The days passed and Emma gradually began to relax into her new life, though she still couldn't help but look over her shoulder, constantly worried she'd be found out. And she truly didn't want to give any of this new life up. She loved her new job. She loved her studies, which were progressing well.

Hermione wasn't as good as Dean Thomas, but she wasn't without talent.

It was a little known fact that she'd always liked to draw. No one, not even her best friends, knew she that not only could she draw well but that she actually loved it. It'd been an outlet for her since she was very young.

Before Harry and Ron, she hadn't had many friends. Drawing was something she could do easily by herself. She had scads of Moleskine journals back home, all filled with drawings she hadn't shown a soul. Most of them were highly realistic drawings of random things; her room, various views at Hogwarts, her classmates, her parents and a number of strangers she'd drawn during the summers when visiting the park near her home.

But drawing wasn't the same as painting, she knew this intellectually. Moreover, she wasn't interested in doing something easy. She had specifically decided to paint exclusively with oil paints, which was one of the most difficult mediums to paint in. Her teachers thought she was mad. It was unthinkable for a beginner, like her, to paint with oil. It was considered simply too difficult and most students were encouraged to get used to painting with acrylic first, which was easier to use. Emma thought it was a whole load of waffle. She'd mastered watercolor by herself from reading books about it. Oil couldn't be all that difficult.

To make it even more of a challenge, she had decided to eschew more modern techniques.

All her drawings were drawn in a highly realistic style which she had parroted from the Great Masters. She had first gotten the idea to draw like that from books she'd read about da Vinci and Hans Holbein, both of whom had sketched prolifically. Her particular favorite was the sketch for Sir Thomas More's family portrait Holbein had done, which she'd often used as a personal source of inspiration. It wasn't that much of a leap to go from drawing like the Great Masters did to painting like they did.

Her very favorite artist was Vermeer, mostly because no one was 100% sure how he became such an accomplished artist with little to no training. He didn't leave behind any sketches and there was very little preparatory work visible underneath the paint in his known works.

The mystery of it was intriguing, not to mention that the mathematical precision to his paintings that had always delighted her. When she was very little, her father had a book about him. She'd spend hours looking at the various plates, sometimes with her father's magnifying glass so she could look at the all the little details. Everyone always went on and on about the 'Girl With a Pearl Earring' - it was his best known work. But Emma was fonder of paintings like 'The Milkmaid' with its quiet domesticity or 'The Music Lesson' for its precise geography.

She was also a fan of Artemisia Gentileschi who was a rare female Great Master and whose handling of chiaroscuro was second to none. There was a dense glow about Gentileschi's paintings that she admired. It was perhaps a bit shallow of her, but she did like Artemisia's most well-known work, 'Judith Slaying Holofernes'. But there was something dreadfully dramatic about the painting, considering it depicted a woman grimly beheading a man while he slept.

Her intent was to learn how it was that artists like Vermeer and Gentileschi made their paintings. To revive the somewhat forgotten and disused techniques perfected by the Great Masters for a modern audience. She had to concede that the techniques used were considered by most to be antiquated. Even her teachers thought she was a bit daft and had tried to push her into the direction of a more Impressionistic or Abstract approach, which were both more popular. But to her, that was the easy path, really. She had nothing against Impressionism or any other art movement; this was just something she felt she had to do.

All she had to do was figure out how it was done. Even though they all thought she'd gone 'round the twist, her professors were helpful and encouraging, pointing her to the resources she'd need for such an undertaking. And with practice, she improved. It was a simple matter of measurement and paying close attention to details.

She had already figured out what her senior project would be, which involved how the great masters like Vermeer made such accurate likenesses from drawing to painting. It involved placing a mirror at just the right angle and using it as a constant reference - basically they had used a simplified camera lucida. She intended to make one herself and use it to replicate to techniques used by Vermeer to create a modern day version of his work. Of course, it was entirely too early to be looking that far ahead, but old habits die hard.

To top it all off, she was officially at the seven month mark and her belly had gotten quite big. A few days ago the baby kicked, to Émile's delight and horror.

"It's like you have the alien inside you," he commented, making a funny face as he pushed the little foot back with a finger. "I think we must contact Sigourney Weaver immediately."

Emma had laughed and smacked him on the arm.

Other improvements included her French. She still had a bit of an accent, but it was gradually fading as she'd stopped speaking English almost entirely. If she was to be Emma Didier, she would have to commit. Hermione was English. Emma was French. It was as simple as that.

In January, her new friends along with Madame Broussard arranged for a surprise baby shower at the club Émile frequented in the Marais. It was the strangest baby shower Emma had attended to date. Mostly because the entertainment included a plethora of beautiful drag queens and more confetti than she'd seen in her life. Perhaps it was the hormones, but she burst into happy tears.

And on February 8th, 1999, Remus Levi Didier was born in a private suite in Sainte Félicité Hospital to the general joy of all.

* * *

First off, I just want to thank everyone for reviewing. There were a lot of emotional reviews and I was a bit surprised at how strong the emotions were. I've been working on this for awhile and, funny thing, you get to a point in your writing where you don't really see the emotional impact anymore. Because I'm too close to the story that I have to shut it down so I can write it. I am very happy to see how affected you all are by what I wrote.

BUT... please keep in mind, people make mistakes in life. That's what this story is all about. The mistakes we make when we're young. It's about the regrets we have for the decisions we made when we're young. Hermione is going to make a mistake in this chapter... just like Harry did. They both made mistakes. And it's okay to be frustrated with them. But don't be too mad. Also, yes, for those who are worried about it, there will be a happy ending.

Also this will not turn into a goofy love triangle story, where she flaunts her fake husband. Those stories can be fun, but this isn't one of those stories. I did it as a sort of cheeky wink at those kinds of stories.

Weird side note, the look for Nathalie's character is based on French-Egyptian singer, Dalida.


	3. Chapter 3

If people were unhappy with Hermione last chapter, I'm pretty sure you'll be unhappy now as well. I have a feeling that asking those folks to be patient and let the story unfold will fall on deaf ears. But I still have hope... so be patient. Also, unless otherwise indicated, they will be speaking in French in this story. I will indicate if Hermione switches back to English, but assume from this point forward that all dialogue is actually in French.

* * *

The first year she had left Britain had truly been the hardest. She had been coming apart at the seams when she'd arrived in France and she had been so unbelievably lost. It felt at the time like everything that made her who she was had been set on fire and left to burn. Doing a runner the way she did had been a move made out of pure desperation and she wasn't yet sure if it had been a good idea or a bad one. But the one thing that got her through was her son; perhaps the only decision she made back then that was objectively rational and sane.

It had been seven years since she'd left. Much had happened in that time. She had just completed her Master's Degree in Art History. In January she would take up her new post in the Research Department of the Louvre while she worked towards her PhD. At the moment she was being mentored by one of the more experienced researchers who was helping her with her final thesis. The new post came with a huge pay raise. She was officially salaried. Beyond all that, the opportunity to study great works of art at close range was truly an honor. Right now they were examining and preparing to restore a recently rediscovered da Vinci painting and she couldn't be more excited.

The biggest change, of course, was her son... he had given her the purpose she'd been looking for. From the moment she held him in her arms her world had changed, titled on its very axis. He was born with his father's dark hair but with her olive complexion as if he'd taken a bit from both his father and his mother as some kind of compromise. He was beautiful and perfect... he was her everything. Nothing else mattered.

It would have been hard to juggle a job and being a student with a young son, but she was fortunate that little Rémi had no shortage of volunteers to watch him. From the gay couple that owned the bookstore Émile had once worked at to the majority of their friends (all of whom Rémi had blessed with the appellation of Tante or Oncle) and, of course, Madame Broussard, who Rémi regarded as a grandmother - going so far as to call her Mémé, a more casual word for grandmère. She was supremely grateful to Émile and Nathalie, who had taken her in and treated her like family.

From the moment she'd met Émile, she had thought of him as the older brother she always wanted. And she knew Émile felt similarly. He was the youngest brother in a family with four older sisters and he'd often told her how he wished for a younger sibling. Emma fit the role nicely. Not to mention Nathalie, who hadn't minded taking in another child, with the bonus of getting her own grandchild to boot. They'd given her so much while asking for very little in return (contrived two year marriage plan with subsequent hilariously amusing divorce notwithstanding) and were integral in granting her a new start.

Rémi had begun kindergarten this year, which had been hard for Emma personally. Sure, he'd been to daycare when he was very young and when he turned three she'd sent him to pré-maternelle, which was the French version of preschool. But this was different - It was the beginning of her realization that her son was really growing up.

She had visions of her time in primary school, which was not a happy experience. His father hadn't said much about his life outside Hogwarts, but from what little he'd told her he painted a very bleak picture as well. She didn't want that for her son. So she was terrified when she'd sent him off, worried about what would happen, if he'd be happy. There was no surprise he'd like school itself, he was her son, after all. It was just the making friends bit that made her anxious.

She needn't have worried. With his mother's smarts and his father's curiosity and knack for mischief - well, in short order he had a small group of tight knit friends. Those three traits were a very powerful combination.

The third day in school and he'd made a classmate quack like a duck for the whole rest of the day because he'd made fun of his new friends, Chloé and her twin brother Adrian who came from Quebec. They'd been doing rude impressions of them because of their accent. Rémi had asked them to stop and they didn't. Shortly thereafter, they were quacking like proper canards. Of course, no one could prove he'd done it, but Emma knew better.

From that point forward she didn't worry quite so much about him.

He went to L'Ecole Nationale de Magie which was a governmental run educational institution for magical children that was compulsory from age 6-10. It was comprised of 50 separate schools all over France. Emma hadn't even known it existed until Nathalie had told her about it. Émile had graduated from one when he'd been asked to leave Beauxbatons. Enrollment in any of the schools maintained by the Ecole Nationale required the student to be a citizen or a foreigner with full-time residency in France and fluency in French, hence why it was not advertised to outsiders.

After age 10, of course, a parent could choose to continue their education at a National School or they could choose to send them to a private academy like Beauxbatons or Hogwarts. Nathalie indicated that most pureblood magical families chose Beauxbatons. She had enrolled her son at the time because her ex-husband had said it was the best. It was where he'd gone and where he'd insisted his son would go.

But in Madame Broussard's opinion, the National Schools were better as they taught combined history to show how intertwined both worlds really were, rather than solely teaching their students about wizarding history. According to her, they were far truer to the French Republic's values of Liberty, Equality, Fraternity than Beauxbatons, which upheld older, monarchist values that were pitiably antiquated and far behind the rest of Modern Wizarding France.

"Doesn't take a genius to see why those pureblood bastards preferred Beauxbatons to L'Ecole Nationale," Madame Broussard had quipped. "I don't know how they get away with calling themselves French; they are nothing but bourgeois aristocratic Bourbons with wands. It's ridiculous."

Of course, they weren't learning magic just yet. In the early years, the school taught them basic life skills like reading and math. There were physical education lessons, along with music and art - the only discreet difference between Wizarding France's education system and their muggle counterparts. It was all in all a very well rounded education (mainly meant to thumb their noses at the muggle world as well as the more Pureblood friendly world of Hogwarts and Beauxbatons). Emma was just pleasantly surprised that there was a government in the world, mundane or magical, that managed to have something resembling a sensible system.

It was the holiday season now and Rémi was on break for the next two weeks. Émile and his partner Radhi were hosting their annual family holiday get together that year and they were late, as usual. Emma was attempting to get herself together. She'd managed to get Rémi ready, fighting through a lot of whining and foot dragging on his part. He never liked dressing up. Nathalie had shown up moments ago and was keeping her son busy, who, as far as he was concerned, felt that all this lead up was silly adult nonsense.

"Emma, dear, does his hair _ever _stay down?" Nathalie called from the living room.

Putting an earring in as she shuffled in to answer without shouting. She paused and laughed at her adoptive mother. Poor Nathalie was attempting to tame her son's hair, and failing miserably. "No, it doesn't. You might as well quit while you're ahead."

"You know I don't like this word 'no'," Nathalie shot back with good humor.

"Tell that to Rémi's hair."

This elicited a giggle from her son. She smiled exasperatedly at him. He had a cowlick, just as his father had, and it was sticking up as bad as ever. She was sure he was making it stick up like that on purpose, the little stinker. He gave her his best smile.

"You shouldn't tease your grandmother, Rémi. Apologize."

He scrunched up his nose and pouted, eventually relenting when she gave him a sharp look of disapproval. "I'm sorry, Mémé. I should not use magic to tease you."

Nathalie knew better than to interfere with her grandson's punishment. She would easily forgive him, as always. It was a grandmother's duty to spoil their grandchildren, after all. But it was a mother's duty to teach their children right from wrong. Emma had strong opinions when it came to how wizards and witches used their magic. She felt that using them to bait or tease people was cruel, especially non-magical people. Nathalie agreed heartily. Her own family's treatment by the wizarding world made it clear to her that wizards thought they were better than those without magic. She approved of how Emma was raising her grandson.

Emma checked her watch, and cursed under her breath. "We're going to be late!"

"Maman, we're always late."

"Not always," And he giggled again when she stooped down to tickle him.

After some last minute scrambling, they all hustled down the narrow stairs of her apartment to Madame Broussard's car and driver, which was waiting for them in front of the building. They drove off, headed for Émile and Radhi's new flat in the 4th Arrondissement near the café he'd opened three years ago. It was doing well now and he had enough money to afford a much nicer place.

Emma still lived in their old one in the 19thArrondissement. Nathalie had encouraged her to move several times, offering to help out if she needed it. As grateful as she was to Nathalie, she had her own money now and no longer needed the support as badly as she had when she first came to Paris. Besides, Emma much preferred living here. It was a good apartment for just her and Rémi. They knew all the neighbors. There was no reason to leave. It was home.

Émile's new flat was a sleek, modern affair with a series of wide windows that let in light nicely. The sun had already set and all that could be seen outside were the dim lights of the city. It mildly irritated her that Émile had decided to decorate his flat almost completely in light colors. She and Radhi had told him that dark colored upholstery held up better, especially since there'd be six year old regularly visiting his home. And six year olds weren't known for their neatness, especially when eating. She supposed her friend would have to learn the hard way. It did look nice with all the festive decorations, though.

Rémi barreled into the flat, all smiles. "ONCLE ÉMILE!"

He plucked up his young nephew and swung him around. "It's my favorite nephew!"

He giggled at that, he liked that his uncle said that even though Rémi knew he was Émile's _only_ nephew. "Oncle Émile when do we open presents?"

"Straight to the point tonight, aren't we?" Rémi nodded, his eyes sparkling. "After dinner."

Rémi sighed dramatically, squirming out of his uncle's arms to go bother Oncle Radhi for candy. Emma pretended not to notice Radhi ruining her son's appetite with a bowlful of Petit Ourson. Meanwhile, Nathalie's driver had come up with the presents before he left for the next few hours.

"Happy holidays," she said as she greeted Émile. "The flat looks lovely."

"Thank you," he replied, helping her out of her coat. "I love your dress, darling."

"Of course you do, you picked it out, you prat," she teased, smacking him playfully on the arm.

They then sat down with him to catch up for a bit while Rémi was busy gathering together all his presents under the tree into one place. Nathalie went into the kitchen with Radhi to help in getting dinner together. Minutes later the doorbell rang once more as more guests appeared - Émile's older sister Marcelle and her new beau, Devon Weeks, an American born wizard. Marcelle was four years older than Emma and had been recently working in Honduras quelling an outbreak of Dragon Pox for Médecins Sans Frontièr's Magical Division. Her training as a healer was why Emma hadn't met Marcelle until her second year in Paris.

Much like her mother, Marcelle wasn't all that picky when it came to lovers; they came and went like the tide. Devon was probably the eleventh partner they'd met in the last three years. He was the best so far. He was gregarious, humble, and didn't judge the strange collection of people that made up this little family. She and Émile both hoped this one might be THE one she'd actually keep.

Meanwhile, Tante Marcelle had gladly taken over entertaining Rémi, who was getting restless and fidgety, giving him her cell phone to play with. Emma , with Émile's help, had charmed the phone so that it worked in an intensely magical environment, though it was a bulky utilitarian thing, which was good - Rémi had already dropped it on the hardwood floor twice.

Emma greeted the new arrival warmly, introducing herself. "It's nice to finally meet you," she said in English, which she'd rarely spoken in seven years. It sounded strange to her ears, and it took longer than she liked to remember how to speak her mother tongue. "How are you finding Paris?"

"It's been wonderful. We've got a few more weeks here before we have to leave. Marcelle and I were hoping to spend some time with you and your son. She's told me a lot about him," he said, looking over to where Marcelle was still entertaining Rémi. "He's a cute kid."

"Tell that to me in a few hours when he starts getting tired and cranky," she said, shaking her head genially.

They both laughed. Devon gave her a speculative look once things died down. "You know, I know it's crazy, but you look awfully familiar. The minute I saw you, I swore I'd seen you before but we've never met..."

Emma covered her shock, looking down as she played with her necklace. "Yes, that is a bit strange. It's just déjà vu, I suppose. Excuse me, I should go rescue Marcelle," she explained hurriedly, turning abruptly to collect her son and to effectively end the conversation to keep it from going in an uncomfortable direction.

Eventually dinner was served. It was typical French fair for a holiday feast. The main meal was goose served with stuffing made with chestnuts, shallots, and mushrooms. There were also roasted potatoes seasoned with herbs de Provence and sautéed haricots verts seasoned with garlic, salt and red pepper. And of course, lots of wine.

She helped Rémi put together his plate first, steering away from the stuffing as he didn't much care for mushrooms. And then she served herself. Emma carefully watched Rémi as he ate. He was old enough now to be a little more independent, but he still needed help with things on occasion. If there was a part of her former life she couldn't rid herself of it was the fact that she worried too much.

After dinner came desert, a lovely bûche de Noël that Radhi had baked himself. He'd made it chocolate flavored for Rémi, rather than something fancier like coffee or praline. As always, Rémi was delighted by the little miniature decorations on it and gave a silly little laugh when Radhi allowed him to eat one of the fondant mushrooms. She gazed at her son fondly as he nibbled on the cap of his faux mushroom, smoothing his hair gently. He looked up at her then and smiled brightly. She had noticed as he got older that the green in his eyes had become more and more prominent with each year. In that moment, he looked so much like his father it hurt.

Rémi was a very perceptive child and immediately noticed the change in his mother's demeanor. "Maman, are you okay?"

"Yes, I'm fine," she replied smoothly, as always unnerved by how observant he was.

"But you looked so sad," he insisted, his voice rising slightly in concern.

"You're just growing up so fast, that's all."

His little cheeks puffed out in indignation. "I'm not growing fast at all. I am growing just the right amount."

Emma laughed lightly, kissing the top of his head. He grinned, his eyes lighting up with childish happiness that he was able to make that strange anguished expression go away. His worry was quickly forgotten as they'd gotten to the part he'd been waiting for, presents.

Christmas in the Broussard household was a hectic affair that bordered on pure anarchy. It took Emma some getting used to. Her family, while religious, didn't take it to the extremes the Broussards did. Her father came from a very traditional Jewish family, which he'd long ago lost contact with due to their vast differences of opinion. Richard was far more progressive in his beliefs, which had deeply disappointed his own father. And the fact that he decided to marry a girl from a non-observant Jewish family who didn't keep strict kosher had been the nail in the coffin.

That didn't mean that Richard himself wasn't observant, and it certainly didn't mean that Helen was opposed to becoming more devout. He and Helen had talked it over before they'd gotten married. While they were still dating, they'd joined the oldest liberal synagogue in London on St. John's Wood Road. It had been the synagogue Helen and Richard had gotten married in. And when they'd been blessed with a child, the rabbi had come to their home had performed a Simchat Bat for their newborn baby girl. They observed all the major holidays properly and while they didn't keep perfect kosher, they tried.

The thing she remembered most from when she was young was that the holidays were always calm and laid-back, and very, very quiet. There was something relaxing about spending a night with her parents, having a nice meal and exchanging small gifts. When she was really little, they'd play dreidel together. Her dad would always let her win, while her mum was an amusingly ruthless player. And then, of course, there was the lighting of the menorah - her father and mother would sing together after lighting it. And the way their voices would mix together had always made her feel calm and a little sleepy. It was all very reflective, a quiet moment in their otherwise busy life.

Nothing at all like the holidays at the Broussards, who seemed determined to make it a semi-stressful production. She guessed it was because she'd never had a large family to impress, so her parents naturally were more low-key when celebrating high holy days like Rosh Hashanah. Or perhaps it was just some Christian thing she didn't understand; some need for ostentation that came from being Catholic that was, quite frankly, beyond her and always would be (thank G-d). She'd been too polite to even ask.

The only bit she liked was opening presents. When she was little, her mother had always forced her to open her Hanukkah gifts slowly so she could take pictures, which had always annoyed her. Each night, she had just wanted to rip into the gift given and just open it, but her mother was always insistent that she be careful about it. But with the Broussards, they grabbed presents higgledy-piggledy, everyone opening them all at once. There was a cacophony of surprised gasps and loud 'thank yous' as haphazardly torn off wrapping paper filled the air.

Her son ran at her full tilt, one of his presents in his hand. "MAMAN! MAMAN! DID YOU SEE WHAT ONCLE ÉMILE AND ONCLE RADHI GOT ME!?"

And he held out a broom just big enough for a six year old boy. She'd always been conflicted on participation in a Christian holiday with her son and this was one of the reasons why - horribly lavish gifts that she had a hard time accepting. There was no polite way to decline gifts given in this fashion, and she'd felt obligated in the beginning because of how much she owed the Broussards. It had been bad enough when it was the usual toys they'd bestowed upon her son but this...

Emma looked at the thing like it was a dangerous viper, frowning as she addressed her friend in English, "Émile, you shouldn't have. And I really mean it... you know how I feel about his kind of thing. He's too young."

"Oh, don't be like that, Emma. Let the boy have some fun."

"Where's he even going to fly it? We live in a flat on the fifth floor, for god's sake!"

"There's an Urban Quidditch league near Port d'Ivry. They have loads of free space where you can practice for a small fee," Marcelle commented helpfully. "Devon and I don't have any assignments until after the new year. We wouldn't mind giving him a few lessons. Right?"

"Yeah, no problem," he replied with a wide smile. "Haven't played Quidditch since college. It'd be fun, and I wouldn't mind teaching the kid some tricks."

Rémi didn't speak very much English yet so he had a hard time following the conversation but he did get the gist of it. They were trying to convince his mom that having his own broom was a good thing. "Please, Maman!" he pleaded, clutching his broom close. "Please let me keep it!"

"Oh, fine. But I'm coming after all of you if he gets hurt," she relented huffily as she eyed her brother in all but blood beadily.

Émile had been arguing with her about this for ages. She supposed it had to do with the fact that his family had a long history as broom manufacturers. He'd gotten his first broom at age five and had wanted to get Rémi one last year, which she'd absolutely forbidden. The sneak had gotten one this year and gave it as a present hoping to force her to weaken her resolve, and it had bloody worked. The look she'd given him meant there was a talk they'd be having later in their future. Once she was sure Émile would take with a liberal grain of salt. Having young men who didn't listen to her was apparently her burden to bear no matter where she was.

She turned and translated their conversation so her son knew he'd be able to keep the broom.

He promptly let out a little whoop of triumph and sat down in her lap, excitedly chattering about his new broom and how he could play Quidditch with his friends now. Again, she was struck by how much like his father he was, but this time Rémi didn't see the sad look that crossed her face. No one else but Nathalie caught it, though she said nothing.

By the end of the night, her son was exhausted, all his new toys scattered around her as his head rested sleepily on her shoulder. The car and driver had arrived but she'd not gone with Nathalie. Instead, she decided to stay over at Émile's because her son had pretty much already fallen asleep. It'd be too much effort to drag him and his presents up five flights of stairs. It wasn't the first time she'd done so, nor the last. Besides, there was a bit of holiday tradition - she and Émile had always spent Christmas day together with her son at the Champs-Elysées.

It started their first year together. Emma was distinctly uncomfortable with celebrating Christmas but felt discomfited bringing it up with Nathalie, as she owed her so much. Émile wasn't blind to the reason for her reaction but he also knew his mother could be stubborn to a fault. He had managed to get her to compromise. They'd come to her huge overelaborate Christmas Eve bash so that they could have the 25th to themselves to do whatever they wanted.

She'd brought changes of clothes as well as Rémi's blankie, which he couldn't sleep without. Carrying her son in, she carefully helped him out of his party clothes and into his jim-jams. She handed him his blankie and tucked him in, rubbing his little shoulder as he got settled. He looked up at her groggily, his expression was troubled.

"Maman..."

"Yes, sweetie?" He turned around so he was facing her, squirming a bit uncomfortably as he t. It was what he did when he wanted to say something but was afraid he might get in trouble. "You can tell me."

"In school, Madame Gagnon asked us to talk about what our families did for the holidays. Chloé and Adrian... they talked about doing stuff with their mom AND their dad. But... but their parents aren't married no more. But they still do things together and she asked me about my dad and..." He said this all in one hurried breath, tears gathering in his eyes as he trailed off.

Emma closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She knew this day would come. "You're wondering about where your father is," she stated, her voice remarkably steady.

He gazed up at her through his bangs and nodded, his eyes very large as he wiped away his tears. She had no idea how to begin. Truthfully, she'd been hoping to hold it off until he was a bit older but she should have known that he'd have questions way before then. Raking her hands through her hair, she clumsily crawled into bed. She rearranged the pillows and dragged Rémi onto her lap, burying her nose in his soft, dark hair for a minute.

"I'm going to tell you a story," she began, holding him close as she paused briefly to think. "Did you know that your mummy isn't really from France?"

He shifted in her arms to look up at her in astonishment. "You're not?"

"Nope. I was born here but when I was your age I lived in England with my parents. That's also where your father is from. See, we both went to the same school. You've heard of Hogwarts, haven't you?"

"Mmhmm. Madame Gagnon said it's one of the schools we can go to when we're older."

"Well, that's where I went when I was eleven years old to learn magic. It's also where I met your father. We were the very best of friends back then. And then... the war happened. Your father and I were part of a group that fought against Voldemort."

The little boy thought for a moment, his head resting limply against her shoulder. "Did my dad die in the war?" he asked very quietly. "Is that how come he's not here?"

It'd be very easy to lie to him, but Emma couldn't do it. Her son deserved the truth, or at least as much as she could safely tell a six year old. "No, he's still alive. He beat him... Voldemort. Your father and I and all our friends, we beat him."

"Then... then how come he's not with us? Is it..." he trailed off, curling in on himself a little bit in the same way his father would when he started blaming himself for things he had no control over.

"No, it's not your fault. It's mine," she sighed, resting her cheek against the top of his head. "After the war... your father was very sad. He lost many friends in the war, we both did. And... and, well, your father and I did something you're only supposed to do with someone you _really_ love. Problem was I loved your father very much and while he cared for me... he didn't love me the same way."

"But... why not?" He said, almost outraged at the thought that someone didn't love his mom.

"Because love isn't so simple."

"Is this one of those things where you say I'll understand when I'm older," he grumbled, looking up at her with a pout.

She gave a short, soft laugh. "No, not really - I mean you will, but I think you're smart enough to understand most of it. My point is... if you could choose who you loved, it'd make things simple. But you can't. Your father didn't love me the way I loved him, and neither of us should be mad at him for that." She paused for a moment, looking out of the window at the city lights. "Your father loved someone else and he decided to marry her. I won't lie to you, it hurt me a lot but I was never angry at him. But I couldn't stay... it hurt too much. So I left. But when I left, I made a mistake..."

"But you don't make mistakes!"

"Oh, yes I do. I've made lots of them." She went silent for a bit, mastering the tears that threatened to fall. With a soft sigh, she continued as if she'd never stopped. "When I left, I didn't know I was pregnant with you," she said quietly, carefully running her fingers through his tangled hair. "And once I _did_ know... I made the choice not to tell your father. See, he's... he's very, very famous. Everyone in the wizarding world knows his name. If I'd said something... there'd be a huge scandal and there are plenty of people out there who hate him... people who would use you to get to him. I thought if I kept it secret, it'd be better, safer. I thought I was protecting you, but... now I'm not so sure. Sometimes, I think it'd be better if I _had_ told him. But then I think of all the negative attention it'd bring to me, and, _more importantly_, to you-"

"But Maman... we _can _just go tell him!"

"No, Rémi, it's not that simple..."

"YES, IT IS! GROWN UPS ALWAYS SAY STUFF LIKE THAT. BUT IT _IS_ THAT SIMPLE!" he shouted, losing his temper just as his father often did, quickly and without warning. "WE JUST GO AND TELL HIM AND YOU SAY YOU ARE SORRY AND THEN I CAN HAVE A DAD LIKE EVERYONE ELSE"

"RÉMI, STOP! JUST STOP!" she shrieked sharply, instantly quieting the boy. Emma had hardly ever raised her voice to him and it was so jarring that he started to cry. "Oh, I'm sorry, Rémi. I shouldn't have shouted. Mummy's so sorry..." He struggled against her at first as she held him and cried, but eventually he relented. And then she pulled back and held his little face in her hands, wiping the tears from his cheeks. "Rémi, this is all my f-fault. And I'm so s-s-sorry. I... I-I've tried so hard to p-protect you and all I've done is h-hurt you. I'm so sorry."

"It's okay, Maman... Please don't be mad! I'm sorry, I shouldn't have shouted," Rémi replied tearfully, more responding to his mother's upset than anything else. It scared him.

Emma shook her head, kissing his cheek. "No, I hurt you, Rémi. I shouldn't have lost my temper. You don't have to apologize because _NONE_ of this is your fault... I'm a grown up. I should know better. Okay? You did nothing wrong." She didn't say anything for a long moment, looking at her beautiful, perfect son, whose life she'd made so much harder than necessary. Inhaling deeply and exhaling slowly, she curled her pink around his and held it up. "When I was little, we used to make 'pinkie promises' to let someone know we really meant what we said. So, I'm gonna make a 'pinkie promise' with you."

"Pin-kee proh-meese," Rémi repeated, testing the unfamiliar English words on his tongue.

"I promise that when you are much older, you and I will go and find your father and tell him together, okay?"

"Really?" he whispered, a hopeful look on his tired little face.

"Mmhmm. Really," she confirmed, hugging him close. "Would you like me to tell you about him?"

He nodded, his head bumping into her a chin as he got comfortable. "What is his name?"

She thought for a moment. "James. His name is James." It was the only lie she'd told that night.

"What does he look like?"

"A lot like you, actually."

"He does?!" he exclaimed excitedly. He looked like his dad; the thought made his heart beat a thousand miles a minute.

"Yup. Would you like to know how we met?" He gave another little nod, again bumping her chin uncomfortably. "The very first time I met your father, I was looking for a toad that a boy named Neville had lost..."

* * *

I put this one at the end for those who've gotten to the end of this chapter, hopefully. As I said in the note on the first chapter, this story is about a Hermione who happens to be Jewish. I've tried very hard to depict a blended religious family. I was nervous because it does show Hermione as a Jewish person participating, however unwillingly, in Christmas... and I know that's a sensitive subject. I tried my very best to handle it as carefully as possible, but I know not being Jewish myself... I might not have gotten it right. I really hope I have. As I said in my original note, lived experience trumps research. I did my best to research everything, but I know I'll mess up. Apologizing in advance... I'm sorry if I fucked it up. Please PM me with any corrections you think might help. Thank you!


	4. Chapter 4

Happy holidays everyone! Here's a new chapter. I love you.

* * *

As it often was with children, the awkward discussion of the night before was put to the back of her son's mind. Today, they were going to the Champs-Elysées and his uncle had promised that he'd buy him something at the Christmas market and perhaps he'd be able to convince them to get a Nutella and banana crêpe as well. Émile and Radhi said nothing about the argument she'd had with her son, though they likely heard at least some of it. It weighed on Emma's mind the whole day.

Over the years it became clear that not telling Rémi's father about his son was unequivocally the wrong thing to have done. It was a stupid decision made during perhaps the worst time in her life, but that in no way negated the horrible consequences of that decision. And every day that she waited made it worse. Somewhere along the line, she'd run out of Gryffindor courage and was unable to take the steps necessary to make it right. She could not face him and what she'd hidden from him. She couldn't bring herself to make him hate her for what she'd done - because she knew without question that he would. Rémi was as much his son as he was hers; he deserved a chance to know him.

Her attention was turned back to her son, his high, piping voice carrying over the sounds of the crowd sweetly. "MAMAN! LOOK! LOOK!" he shouted, grabbing her hand and dragging her over to one of the Christmas chalets selling an assortment LED illuminated chachkes.

Rémi was pointing excitedly to a glass lion statue mounted on a mirrored stand that was softly changing color. It was the ugliest thing she'd ever seen, and it cost €15, an absolutely absurd amount of money considering the terrible quality of the product. Of course, she bought it for him.

They spent a good five hours wandering around the Christmas market, until Rémi became tired and cranky. He fell asleep on his uncle on the Metro ride home. Émile had agreed to deliver all their gifts tomorrow as he carried Rémi up five flights of stairs to her apartment. The day after next, they'd meet Marcelle for Rémi's first flying lesson, and her son would want his broom.

He woke instantly once they got inside the apartment, tiredly insisting that they light the menorah. Emma was certain that it was more the promise of a gift and latkes than the actual lighting of the candles. She was wrong, though. When told that the latkes and his gift could wait, Rémi wasn't satisfied. He still insisted so Emma relented.

The menorah was set up by the window. Émile watched silently as Emma carefully set everything up, reciting the proper blessings before lighting it. Shamash candle lit, she carefully handed it to Rémi who touched it to the first candle solemnly. By the light of the candles, Emma sang Hanerot Halalu. Her son rested his head on her arm, looking up at her with an anguished expression. She stopped singing abruptly.

"Rémi, what's wrong?"

"Do you think papa will see our lights and come home to us?" he asked in a little voice, tears spilling slowly down his cheeks.

Emma was unable to speak; it felt like someone had shot an arrow straight into her heart. What in Merlin's name would she tell him? Taking a steadying breath, she smiled and said, "Hanukkah is a time for miracles, Rémi. So, while I don't know if he'll come home to us, we can always hope and pray that he does."

Her son gave her a wobbly smile, palming away his tears. "Then I hope a miracle does happen. I pray he sees our lights and comes home." He turned away and went quiet for a beat, his eyes never leaving the flickering candles. "Can you tell me about the oil in the temple, Maman?"

And so she did, though he fell asleep almost halfway through. Tucking him in, she sat for a few minutes and just watched him by the glow of the LED lion, which gave out a surprising amount of light. One little hand was curled around his blanket as he breathed slowly, so deeply asleep he didn't even notice her bending over to give him a kiss on the cheek. She held his other hand in hers, thinking about last night and all the mistakes she'd made. Tears rolled silently down her cheeks and her lips trembled as she suppressed her sobs.

Émile watched her quietly from the door. She stood slowly, gently letting go of her son's hand. Both adults left the room, leaving the door open just a crack. Once they were back in the living room, Émile touched her shoulder lightly.

"Are you going to be okay?" he said in English.

"I don't know," she answered him honestly, her voice quaking. "I think I've made a terrible mistake. And for the first time ever, I don't know how to fix it." Sitting down hard on the couch, she dissolved into tears, breaking in a way she hadn't in a long time.

Over the years, Émile had encouraged her to tell Harry about his son. And every single time she'd either refuse outright, insisting it'd be better if he didn't know, or she wouldn't say anything all, pretending as if she hadn't heard him. Émile knew better than to say I told you so or go over those same points again. It'd do no good. Instead, he just held her.

"I cannot give you a solution, Cherie," he said solemnly. "But I wish I could. I can only say that it will work out for the best. I know it."

"Y-you can't k-know that."

"Pffffht. Yes, I can and I do." He paused, a slow, devious smile creeping across his face. "It's in the staaaaars..."

And just like that, he diverted her emotions to a subject she detested and which she could vent her spleen on all night: Divination. She did go on for a good five minutes before realizing what he'd done. Emma couldn't even be mad at him for his blatant manipulation, because it _had _helped.

A few days later, Marcelle and her boyfriend came over for the promised flying lessons. The Urban Quidditch League at Porte d'Ivry was located near a muggle soccer center. The entryway was what looked like an old, disused delivery door. Just like Platform 9 ¾, you had to simply walk through what looked like a solid door to enter. Rémi had a bit of trouble with it and ended having to have Emma help him through by holding his hand.

They were required to register at the door. The paperwork was extensive, mostly because they were allowing someone so young access to the pitch. Once everything was sorted out, an attendant showed them where they were allowed to practice and then left them to it. Emma decided to sit in the stands. She was rubbish on a broom and would be no help at all.

Watching his father fly had always been nerve-wracking for her. If possible, watching her son learn how to fly was so much worse. Her only comfort was that he had inherited his father's talent for flying; it was almost preternatural, although, he did learn quite a bit from Marcelle and Devon. First and foremost, he learned how to grip the broom properly and various other safety techniques. All the basics anyone could ever need to know, though it was clear it frustrated and bored her son, who simply wanted to fly.

Eventually, they let him do as he pleased. The broom wouldn't go much higher than just a few meters off the ground which was normal for his age. Still, he managed to quite a few breathtaking spins and dives that nearly made Emma's heart stop. During a particularly death defying spin, Emma almost screamed. She rushed out onto the field when he landed, mad with fear. Her son landed gently; his smile huge as he ran towards her.

"MAMAN! DID YOU SEE MY SPIN?! DID YOU SEE ME?!" he shouted happily, his little arms thrown around her shoulders, one hand still holding onto the broom which knocked into his mother's head uncomfortably.

Gently pushing the broom away from her face, she smiled tremulously at him. "Yes, I did, Rémi! You were wonderful!" It wasn't at all what she wanted to say... she'd been so scared, but seeing his excited face she couldn't tell him how all she could see was the number of times his father had fallen from the sky. She kissed his cheek and held him a little tighter.

Others practicing on the field had noticed Rémi, specifically the many coaches littering the field training new recruits. One coach in particular had taken notice almost immediately. He had seen many children come through these halls over the years. There were a fair few that were decent fliers, one or two that were actually exceptional. But he had never seen anyone fly like the dark haired boy he'd just seen performing an Ergot Roll - a difficult defensive maneuver mostly reserved for Seekers that involved attempting a tight, controlled spin at high speed to disorient and displace anyone following them while doing a steep dive for the snitch.

In general, it was an undesirable place to be found in for both the one leading and one following because it required precise control of one's broom. There were few full-grown adults, professionals, in the world with the kind of talent it would take to pull the maneuver off. And this boy had done it for the first time with near perfect form.

He marched straight up to the mother and without preamble informed her of what her son had accomplished, finishing with, "My name is Matthieu Renard. I must train your son."

Emma was startled by the abrupt pronouncement. She'd only just gotten her heart rate down - her son had done some kind of crazy barrel roll. She didn't even know there was a term in Quidditch for what he'd done until the man who'd practically shouted at her that he wanted to coach her son had told her as much.

Emma demurred, "Oh, I don't know. He's only six... that just seems too young."

"Nonsense! It's best to teach them when they are young. He'll learn proper form and, more importantly, I won't be wasting my time forcing him to unlearn bad habits," he declared, sharply slapping one hand into the other in a chopping motion.

"It's just so dangerous..."

"Pah! All the more reason he should be trained. Your son has talent, Madame," the man said with an errant hand wave as if he was dismissing her misgivings. "You must see this."

Marcelle had watched quietly until then. "Emma, I have heard of Monsieur Renard - he is the premier Quidditch coach for Paris's Junior League. He's one of the owners of this complex," she whispered urgently. "This is a huge opportunity."

"I know, but..." Emma trailed off, her brows knitting in concern. There was a tug on her jumper. She looked down at the expressive green eyes of her son.

"Maman, please," he pleaded, little hand curled around the fabric of her sweater. "I want to fly."

Just like his father, she couldn't say no to him. With a sigh and a resigned smile, she said, "Okay, I give up. You win."

Monsieur Renard immediately ushered Emma, her son, and the others into a meeting room to discuss the financial details of this arrangement and a sensible training schedule. None of them had noticed the photographer, who had captured a series of pictures. It showed a mother and her son embracing, wide smiles on both their faces. The photographer had been hired by the owners of the Urban Quidditch League to take pictures for an upcoming feature in a Parisian Quidditch magazine, _Sept Mondial_. A week later, the picture of the unknown mother and her son embracing and smiling was run alongside a special report on the Port d'Ivry League.

No one, not even the photographer who took the photo knew that it would find its way to England. Sept Mondial was a regional publication after all, but within two months it had reached a small press editor in Stratford-Upon-Avon who recognized the woman in the photo. Dean Thomas in his spare time ran a very small magazine for fans of the local Quidditch team, the Stratford Bards. As a rule, he subscribed to a number of magazines abroad for the latest Quidditch news.

In February, he had a nasty shock when he opened the issue of Sept Mondial from December. He was lucky his Mum's first language was French. He didn't speak it well, but his reading comprehension was much better. And after reading the article in question, he'd immediately requested a copy of the photo directly from the photographer, Jehanne-Lucie Méliès. She was a well-known enough name in Quidditch circles, and he had something of a rapport with her, having once arranged for her to take pictures of the Bards. Due to the demands on her time, it had taken her studio nearly four months to get the picture he'd asked about to him. But instead of just one, they'd sent an entire series, all of them of the same woman and child.

There was no question who the woman in the photographs was. Dean wasn't great friends with her, but anyone with eyes could tell you the woman was Hermione Granger, though he had no idea who the kid was, rightly assuming it was probably hers. Though he could not know it, she had dressed casually that day, forgoing makeup and wearing clothes she'd rarely worn outside her flat. Dean might not have recognized her so easily had she dressed as she usually did day to day. But in her oversized sweater and her bushy hair held up by a colorful knitted head-wrap, she looked no different than she had in school. One could almost imagine her running off to study in the library.

Dean struggled with what to do with the photos. Just last year, Hermione had been declared dead by both the Ministry and the muggle government after seven full years with no contact with her friends or relatives. If this photo got out, there'd be a firestorm that the Daily Prophet would milk for all it was worth.

He well remembered the media hysteria surrounding her disappearance. The coverage of it was relentless and pervasive for the first three years. Every time Ron or Harry did something, whether it was a promotion or getting married, they'd dredge up her sudden and inexplicable departure from the wizarding world. For her close friends, it was no doubt an unbearably painful experience that never allowed them to heal properly. Their good news constantly marred. Forever forced to be reminded of the friend who had either died or left them behind. Merlin, if it was him, he wouldn't want all that trotted out again and again. Even knowing her as an acquaintance, it had irritated him enough to cancel his subscription to the Prophet permanently. The Quibbler was loads better, anyway.

Frankly, the whole affair troubled him. He didn't want anything to do with it, if he was honest.

Just as he wasn't great friends with Hermione, he didn't know Harry much better. But even he knew that bringing up Hermione to him was a bad idea. From the rumors he'd heard, her absence had a chilling effect on the remaining members of the trio. He didn't know the details, just that there were a few bad years for both of them. Harry in particular hadn't taken it well and had more than just a few bad years, if the grapevine was to be believed.

He wondered if there was anything to be gained by sending these pictures. It was nothing more than bad memories for Harry and Ron, and he didn't wish to disturb their lives. They weren't his good friends, but they were decent blokes. And they'd managed to make something of their lives despite all the sorrow caused by the war and the subsequent disappearance of their friend. Plus, he hardly wanted to add to anyone's already overabundant woes.

And no doubt Hermione had left for a reason. He didn't know her that well, but the one thing he _did_ know was that when she made a decision, there was no dissuading her from her chosen course. After all, she followed Harry to hell and back. If that didn't say something about her determination, he didn't know what else would. He had never believed for a moment she was dead, but if she'd wanted to come back, she would have. These pictures were evidence enough that she'd made a new life for herself. One she was quite comfortable with.

But it'd be downright irresponsible of him not to say anything and if Potter found out he had this and said nothing... with a deep sigh, Dean composed a short letter and enclosed the photos with the name and date of its original publication and the contact information for the photographer. He called his owl, Falstaff, tying the letter securely to his leg.

"Take this to Harry Potter at the DMLE, he's Assistant Chief Auror now, I think. Be careful, it's really important," Dean said, giving the owl a treat before it took off. He watched Falstaff fly towards the horizon, hoping that he'd made the right decision.

Having no idea that pictures of her and her son were winging their way to the last person she'd want to see them, Emma was enjoying herself as she watch her son collect seashells on the beach and avoiding the seaweed that rolled up with the tide.

Émile had decided that sending his ex-wife/adoptive sister on a family vacation to Biarritz in the south of France was the best way to celebrate the end to her son's very first year in school. He'd taken care to invite Rémi's best friend Chloé and her twin brother Adrian. They were not far from her son, also collecting seashells, though Adrian seemed to have less aversion to seaweed than her son or Chloé.

There were many beaches in Biarritz to choose from. She and Chloé's mother had picked Plage de la Milady as it was a beach that many families frequented. They had a nice hotel nearby which was only five minutes away, less if they rode their bicycles. She was sitting next to Chloé's mother who was splitting her time between reading a magazine and watching the children.

Simone Vasseur was a plump woman with long blonde hair and impeccable taste in clothing. When Emma had first met the mother of her son's best friends, she had been a bit taken aback by the French-Canadian woman, who could only be described as a force of nature. She had immediately enveloped Emma in a hug and began talking a million miles a minute, thanking her for what her son had done for Chloé and Adrian.

On the surface, Simone seemed a bit superficial. She only wore designer clothes and favored Chanel as her perfume of choice. Her Quebecois accent was prominent and to some her love of luxury Parisian brands seemed a blatant effort to seem less provincial. Emma happened to know it wasn't true at all. Simone was a divorcee whose husband had left her for a younger woman. She'd gotten an extremely generous settlement and perhaps felt that she owed herself just a little bit of happiness after all she'd been through. And sometimes happiness came in boxes from Chanel, Louboutin, and Christian Dior.

She also loved her children fiercely. Simone and her ex-husband didn't particularly care for each other anymore, but they had done their best to keep it cordial for Chloé and Adrian. Their visitation schedule was meticulous, and they were in constant communication about it should something unexpected happened. Both parents did their level best to keep either of their children from feeling the sorrow or tension from the end of their marriage.

Emma admired Simone for her dedication to her children's happiness.

But it wasn't just that... Simone was smart, perhaps not in a traditional way, but she was smart none-the-less. She owned a small boutique on the Rue des Voisins Cachés (sometimes simply called Les Voisins) which was the main shopping district/magical enclave in Paris. Her shop was called Maison Jeurelle and it sold her own brand of high-end beauty and personal grooming products for witches and wizards. It was a small brand right now but had done very well. So well that she'd been thinking of opening another store. She even had high hopes of finding a way to transition it so that she could sell to muggles as well.

"We're missing out on a _huge_ market by only selling to those in the wizarding world. I mean, really, all I'd have to do is lay off the charms on certain products or adjust the recipe a bit so it uses non-magical ingredients to replace some of the ones I use and it'd be no different than anything already sold in non-magic stores," she'd explained at lunch earlier that day. "The real difference is in the _quality_ of your ingredients, even if they're not magical... and I'll go toe to toe with anyone that our brand is the best."

Emma couldn't agree more. She used some of her hair care products, which had managed to tame her hair without making it look like a particularly sturdy helmet. They were amazing even without some of the charms added. And if anyone could figure out a way to take a wizarding business into the non-magical world, it'd be Simone Vasseur.

"I see Rémi isn't wearing his glasses," Simone commented, interrupting Emma's train of thought.

"No, he's not," she admitted with a touch of light exasperation, glancing briefly at him as he busily dumped the seashells he'd collected into a small pile.

After the term had ended, Madame Gagnon had mentioned that she thought Rémi might need corrective lenses. She'd noticed him squinting a number of times when reading during lessons. So, Emma had taken him to an ophthalmologist and found that he was farsighted. She let Rémi chose his own frames. With a gleeful squeal, he had marched around the show floor investigating all his options, until he chose square tortoise shell frames with an interior accent in orange, his favorite color. He'd been quite happy when picking them out but once they'd left the ophthalmologist's office, he had refused to wear them. When she'd asked him why, he said it was because it made him look stupid and hurt his eyes. She explained this to Simone with a long-suffering sigh.

"Hmm. Well, we'll just have to get Adrian and Chloé to tell him he looks nice in them, then. Nothing changes a child's mind faster than the good opinions of his friends," her friend declared with an errant hand wave.

Emma chortled at Simone's astute observation while she watched the three friends as they carefully built a little sandcastle, decorating it with the seashells they'd collected. "Yes, I suppose you're right."

Later on, when the kids had tired of collecting seashells and swimming, they went back to the hotel to rest for a bit. Once the kids were cleaned up a bit and had time to nap, they decided to go get something to eat. Emma noticed immediately that Rémi was wearing his glasses and had no doubt she had Simone and her children to thank for it. There was a small restaurant right on the beach that catered to kids and it was "helpfully" called Milady Beach, which was actually confusing as it was named after the beach it was located on. It had a terrace and a playground for the kids, so all in all it was perfect.

The kids ate quite quickly because they were more interested in getting to the playground than anything else. This was frustrated by the two adults as they wouldn't let them leave until everyone was finished. Eventually, Emma and Simone relented. They sat on a nearby bench so they could keep an eye on the children, who made an immediate beeline towards the playground equipment.

Simone and Emma talked quietly for a while, watching with amusement as the three kids ran about wildly. After a bit, Simone excused herself to go to the bathroom and left Emma alone. She was so busy watching her son and his friends that she didn't notice when someone else sat down, taking for granted it was Simone.

"Hullo, Hermione," said a dreamy voice.

Slowly, heart thumping in her chest, she looked over and gasped, saying on reflex in English, "My name's not-"

"Oh, I know it's not your name anymore," interjected Luna Lovegood serenely. "But I'm not sure what your new name is now, and I didn't want to be rude."

"Emma," she answered automatically. Strangely, she didn't for a moment think to deny who she really was even while giving her assumed name. Luna's almost matter-of-fact knowledge of her real identity seemed to destroy any argument on the issue. "What are you doing here?"

"Rolf and I were surveying the local Tarasque population and decided to have a bit of a break. Then I was talking to a very helpful Nain Rouge that was hiding in a bush near our rental just the other day and he said we ought to come here. I'm not quite sure why he's so far from where he belongs, but I am thankful because he said that we'd find something precious and so we did," Luna explained, her smile luminous. "Well, I did, anyway. Rolf is far more interested in looking for selkies, but I don't think he'll find them here. " And she pointed over at the distant figure clumsily climbing an outcropping of rock.

"Too many nargles," Emma murmured, grinning despite herself.

"Most likely. Also, there's far too many people and not nearly enough seals. Selkies quite prefer their company to most humans. He really ought to know better, but I didn't fall in love with him because he was sensible," Luna answered guilelessly. "How have you been?"

"Er, good, I suppose. How are you?"

"Oh, I'm doing wonderfully! I've been traveling with Rolf for quite a while now. We've been doing research on European magical flora and fauna for the last four years. It's been ever so much fun. I never did find evidence of Crumple-Horned Snorkacks, but that's mostly because they don't exist, which is rather sad... but we _have_ finally proved that Tarasques _do_ exist and are discretely different from dragons, which is why we're here, you know."

Her son chose that moment to run over to her, looking for something to drink. His little hand froze as it touched her arm, glancing over at the strange woman sitting next to his mother warily. He looked up at Emma questioningly, pushing his glasses up on his nose.

"Hello, my name is Luna. I'm a very old friend of your mother's," Luna said in French. "What's your name?"

Rémi again looked to his mother, suddenly shy. He'd never done well with strangers. Emma squeezed his hand, her lips tipping up gently to let him know it was okay. His voice was very quiet when he gave his name, holding out his hand which Luna gently shook.

"His name is Remus. We just call him Rémi for short," Emma supplied, not knowing why it was important to tell Luna this.

Luna eyes widened, gazing down at her son suddenly very serious. "You have a very good name, did you know that?"

Rémi shook his head, eyes huge as Luna told him about the man he was named after and how he was the best teacher Luna had ever had. Having rarely heard stories about his mother's past, other than the few she'd told him about his father, Rémi was transfixed. Eventually, her son's friends joined them and listened raptly to Luna - who had graduated from talking about Professor Lupin to more fantastical tales. It was as if she knew revealing the past to Emma's son was acceptable but giving it away to his friends was not.

Simone came back shortly thereafter, and more introductions were given. And then Luna did something unexpected, which should not have been that much of a surprise considering who it was.

"Would you mind if I borrowed Emma for a bit?" she asked Simone airily.

"Of course not," Simone replied a bit quizzically. "Emma, would you like me to take Rémi?"

Before she could even open her mouth to answer, Luna had already exclaimed, "Oh, I wouldn't mind if he stayed. It's been so long since I've seen him!"

All eyes were on Emma now and she felt put on the spot in the worst way. "Uh, Rémi, would you like to go back to the hotel with Simone or stay back here with Luna and me?"

He seemed to consider it for quite some time, looking between his mum and his mum's old friend. "I'd like to visit with Tante Luna a bit longer, please."

Emma tried to hide her surprised reaction, but she was afraid she'd done a poor job of it. Rémi had rarely taken to a stranger so quickly. He had to meet someone at least four or five times before he even became comfortable enough to talk to someone new. The fact that he'd gone from almost hardly being able to say his own name to calling Luna his aunt was remarkable.

"Well, I suppose that settles it then. I'll see you all later," Emma said in a slightly questioning voice.

Simone nodded, giving Luna a last wary look. "All right then. Good evening. It's very nice to have met you, Mademoiselle Lovegood."

"Please, call me Luna."

"Yes, well, of course. Goodbye, Luna," Simone said with a jerky head nod, clearly put off by Luna's strange manner.

Luna's protuberant eyes watched her as she left, blinking slowly before turning her attention back to Emma. Honestly, she had no clue why Luna had wanted to see her alone, though she had a guess. No doubt she'd have all sorts of terribly uncomfortable questions-

"I'm not going to ask why you left," Luna said, gazing at Emma calmly. "It's really none of my business."

"Then why-"

She tilted her head ever so slightly, her eyes wide. "Because I missed my friend," she stated, as if it was the simplest thing in the world.

A confused well of emotion bubbled up just then. The primary feeling was of a great appreciation for Luna - she'd always regretted how shabbily she'd treated her back at Hogwarts, how she'd always belittle her and dismiss her ideas at every turn. Even through all that, Luna thought of her as a friend. Even though she'd left without explanation, Luna had without question _still _considered her a friend.

With a small sob, she caught Luna's hand and squeezed it. "T-thank you. I.. I missed you too..."

The two women hugged tightly before breaking away. They walked down the beach while Rémi ran ahead of them, chasing seagulls. Occasionally he'd find something and would come sprinting back to show Tante Luna, who would 'ooh' and 'aah' over his findings - coming up with ever more extraordinary explanations of what he'd discovered to his utter delight.

Eventually, Rolf joined them. Luna introduced Emma, only mentioning she was an old friend which Rolf seemed to take at face value. "Rolf is very good when it comes to magical beasts, but humans are a bit of a mystery to him," she explained dreamily.

Emma needn't worry he'd get suspicious or guess her real identity. He seemed far more interested in racing Rémi down the beach, only stopping to tell his eager young student about all the magnificent creatures he'd seen on his travels. This allowed Luna and Emma to catch up a bit.

"So... you work at the Louvre."

"You have no idea what it is, do you?" Emma said with a little laugh, not unkindly but in general amusement because Luna had tried hard to pretend she knew what it was.

"None at all. I thought it sounded a bit like an illness of some sort, to be honest," Luna chortled with a shrug, the setting sun making her pale hair look pink.

"It's an art museum - a very famous one, for muggles. I, um, research paintings... my principle interest is those made during Renaissance era but I've been tapped for other things as well. Sometimes we work in tandem with the restoration department to help in repairs."

Luna regarded her with a rather strange look on her face for several moments. "Art... really. How unlike you."

"Yes, I don't suppose it is very much like who I was... but it's who I am now. Did you know that I drew, even back then?" Luna shook her head wonderingly. "No one did, really. I never showed anyone. I was so caught up in being the person everyone _thought I was_ that... that... I was ashamed to show anyone. I don't know why. Everyone always made fun of how much I read. I thought if they knew about that as well... I guess I thought it was just a silly pastime..."

"It wasn't."

"No, it wasn't." And feeling a bit brave, she fished out the Moleskine she brought everywhere with her and handed it to Luna.

The former Ravenclaw took the sketchbook, opening it quite carefully. She let out a little gasp, her fingers hovering over the page as she looked down. Sometimes, on her free days, Emma would go to the Louvre or the Tuileries Garden and just draw the visitors there or the landscape. All the drawings in the sketchbook were in the same highly realistic style she preferred. Luna reached out, holding onto Emma's forearm in an almost painful grip.

"These... these are marvelous, Hermione. You... I can't believe," she stammered in English breathlessly as she turned page after page. "Rolf, come here a moment!"

"Yes, dear. What is it?" He asked, loping over in a rather ungainly fashion.

"Look!" And Luna held out the Moleskine. His eyes widened, letting out a long breath as his gaze met Luna's. "She's perfect!"

Emma watched this exchange with bemusement that turned to alarm. She'd only intended for Luna to look at it and now... "I don't-"

"Rolf and I are about to publish a new book about magical fauna and we've been looking everywhere for the right illustrator," Luna interrupted, all dreaminess gone.

"Yes, we've searched all over and every last artist we looked into was rubbish, but you..." Rolf chimed in excitedly. "You're just what we're looking for. Well, I don't mean to impose but would you..."

"Would you illustrate our book for us?" Luna finished, her pale eyes glistening.

Emma's heart was beating quite quickly. She very much wanted to but she was worried it'd lead to people discovering who she really was. There were just too many questions it'd cause, too many ways for people to suss out her true identity. And just when she opened her mouth to politely decline, her son interrupted her.

"Maman, talk French! I can't understand anyone," Rémi complained, looking disgruntledly at all the adults speaking a language he hardly understood. "What are you talking about?"

"Tante Luna would like me to use my drawings for their book," Emma explained to him in French.

"Well, are you going to?"

"I don't know... I'm quite busy with my work at the museum and-"

Her son frowned at the excuse. "I think you should do it!"

"Do you?"

"Mmmhmm. Then everyone could see your pretty drawings. Plus, you'd be helping Tante Luna, right?"

Luna and Rolf watched the exchange with great delight. Emma, meanwhile, had realized she'd been outmaneuvered by her own son, again. Her inevitable agreement was greeted with the appropriate amount of joy.

"You're quite the little blackmailer, aren't you," she said, giving her son a hug before tickling him to which he giggled wildly.

Over the next three days, they came to an agreement about her work as an illustrator on their book. Luna had offered to allow her six months to get everything done, but Emma had insisted on only three. Even though she no longer went by the name, she was still Hermione Granger deep down inside. She was the girl who pushed herself beyond normal human limitations. This project was no different than all those before.

Luna and Rolf's requirements weren't all that outlandish to begin with. They needed scientific illustrations of the flora and fauna they'd discovered on their most recent trek. Rolf had taken a number of photographs with a regular muggle camera. He'd developed the photos himself and had brought copies with him, which he'd gladly shown Emma. From what he'd gathered, it'd be easy enough to draw from them as reference. He'd agreed to get her more copies.

They'd also arranged to meet her in Paris before the end of the summer for a progress check. Luna was also interested in seeing the famous muggle museum her friend worked at. Rémi was beside himself with glee because he'd be able to show his new Tante Luna around. In those three days, her son had become absurdly attached to Luna.

She had a way of making a game of anything and she brought a more ephemeral kind of magic into the world - one that didn't require a wand. Luna took the world at its most ordinary and made it extraordinary. It also helped that Luna knew his father and could tell him things his mum couldn't.

Luna herself seemed to accept the fact that they were calling Harry by his middle name when talking to her son. But there was a measure of reproach in her eyes when she used it in lieu of his real name.

On their last day together, Luna had given her a lingering embrace, whispering in her ear, "I won't tell anyone I've found you."

Breaking away, Emma nodded somberly. "Thank you."

"You will have to tell him someday, though," Luna warned. "Secrets don't stay that way for long."

"I know," she whispered, cupping her elbows as she looked at her feet.

Luna touched her arm and smiled gently. "I'm very glad it was me who found you first."

"Me too," Emma admitted, grasping Luna's hand and squeezing it. "See you in August."

And with that, they gave a final hug before going their separate ways.


	5. Chapter 5

He had always been a little bit in love with her, though it would take him practically forever to realize it. There was no one moment really that he could point to and say 'there, that was when I fell in love with her'. It lay there unrecognized for years, perhaps because it was such an integral part of him that he'd never taken the time to examine it; that his love for her was in a way no different than the beating of his heart. There was no when or how for him, it just was.

There were moments though, things that he remembered but never consciously thought about.

She was the first person to hug him, that he remembered (his parent's hugs were a long-forgotten memory). The first person that showed him that touch could mean kindness and comfort - that it could heal instead of just hurt. Hermione couldn't have known, at first, how rough life had been for him. She came from a family that loved her. The idea that this brilliant young wizard could be unwanted was unthinkable to her, he knew this. And once she had realized, she cared for him with a fiery indigence that was as charming as it was amusing. As if by caring about him she was directly spiting the Dursley's for their indifference.

She treated him like family. And in return, he treated her like his own, though he had barely any idea what that meant, really. All he knew was that he liked it when she hugged him, though he didn't entirely understand the point of it at first (it seemed especially pointless in first and second year, before puberty hit). But by the time he'd gotten used to it, it had been normal... something Hermione just did. And then it became one of the things he liked best about her, besides being really smart and occasionally funny.

It had taken Ron ages to realize the third member of their group was a girl. Harry had worked it out much more quickly. He'd known in Third Year. That one evening he'd shared the invisibility cloak with her where he'd accidentally brushed against her breast or the flight on Buckbeak when she'd pressed up against his back. His pubescent mind amplifying those moments at the most inconvenient times, no matter how hard he'd tried to forget they'd ever happened. He'd berated himself for those thoughts. Hermione was his best friend. Best friends didn't think about each other like that.

Besides... Hermione was brilliant. She deserved someone as smart as she was, someone who could talk about Ancient Runes and liked to study as much as she did. Someone like her would never go for a duffer like him. Even though she always told him he could do better if he tried, he never really believed her when she said that. Learning had never been easy for him. Sure, he didn't have to worry about being better than Dudley, but almost ten years of pretending to be less smart than you were became a habit that was hard to undo. Anyway, he was less invested in being a good student than he was in learning things that'd help him survive the years ahead.

Ron didn't make much more sense, really. But at least he made her laugh and Harry knew he'd be good to her. She deserved someone like that. And Ron was uncomplicated, he wasn't destined by prophecy to destroy or be destroyed by a dark lord. And who in their right mind would want someone with a Dark Lord after them? All he'd ever done is nearly get her killed time after time after time.

So he stuffed most of those thoughts into the back of his mind, telling himself the affection he felt for her was natural. Sisterly. After all, that's what siblings did... look after each other. He couldn't possibly fancy his best friend. It'd ruin everything if he did that. And so he loved her quietly, without putting much thought into it. It was an ephemeral thing, his love for her. Not so much that the love he had for her was fleeting, but that he rarely recognized it for what it was, letting it slip through his fingers like sand.

But in his own way he loved her all the same.

It was how much he loved that look she'd get just before saying 'I'm going to the library'. How sometimes he'd watch her when she was studying. The private amusement he felt when her nose would scrunch up and she'd bite her lip in frustration at a problem she couldn't quite figure out. And then when she'd found her solution how her face would brighten imperceptibly. It was the nervous way she'd twirl her hair through her fingers just before an important exam as if she wasn't going to pass with flying colors, and how annoyed she'd get with him when he tried to make her see reason when he told her as much.

He thought her ability to focus so keenly on things was enormously endearing. He was in constant awe of her intelligence, sometimes to the point of being a bit intimidated by it but she'd never held back though. Never made herself out to be less capable than she was, and he deeply admired her for that. After all, it was her smarts that had kept him alive. Beyond that, she challenged him to be a better person almost constantly. He hadn't appreciated it back then... he should have.

He'd never gotten to thank her for everything she'd done for him. Never got to let her know how lucky he was to have her as a friend. Never got to tell her how proud he was... how much he appreciated her not just as a person but as a woman.

There were times when he'd come close to realizing just what he had. In the tent during the Horcrux hunt, he'd almost told her then but he couldn't find the right words. He knew if it was him that was distraught, Hermione would have found just the right thing to say. She'd hold him and let out a string of words and comfort that'd make him feel better or at least she'd make sense of it for him. Whenever he had things he didn't understand, he'd go to her. She made things less strange, less upsetting even when there was plenty to be upset about.

But all he managed to do was just stare pensively while trying and failing to think of something to say. So instead, he'd decided to simply get up and dance with her. He was rubbish at it, but he was hoping to at least make her laugh and he did. But he'd made a miscalculation. He hadn't thought ahead to how it'd feel to have her in his arms that way. Hadn't spared a second to think on how intimate things ended up being, all those inconvenient memories bursting forth from some hidden mental dam. Heart hammering, he became acutely aware of how she was pressed up against him. Her head resting between his neck and shoulder, arms looped around him. As if she'd had the same thought, they'd stopped dancing and just stood there holding each other.

He'd closed his eyes and buried his face in her hair, which smelled faintly of coconut, his heart still thundering in his chest as he pulled her closer. And when they finally stepped back... there was a wonderful swooping sensation and a lovely tug to close the gap between them. Staring at her lips, he found that he really wanted to kiss her. And when he looked down into her eyes, he saw she wanted the same. It was madness and yet... but before he could complete the action, she had taken another step back and another. And then she simply walked away.

They didn't talk about it the next morning, but the whole incident was never far from his mind.

Then came the aftermath of the Battle of Hogwarts and Voldemort's defeat... they'd all gone back to the Burrow temporarily for the funeral. Things were worse than awkward. He felt like an intruder... as if he were in the way. He'd tried his best to help in some way, to make the load the Weasleys carried lighter. But he couldn't help but think he was doing more harm than good being here. Even if it wasn't true, he felt as if he was to blame (as if they blamed him). It wasn't logical and if he'd told Hermione, she would have scoffed at him and given an exasperated lecture on why he was wrong, probably with some kind of illustrative graphs. This feeling was mitigated somewhat by Hermione herself, just being there with him.

And then she left. He couldn't help but follow her, telling himself that it was solely to let the Weasleys mourn in peace and to help out with the recovery and repair efforts at Hogwarts. But it wasn't entirely altruistic. Oh, he did need to help out with repair efforts because he ultimately felt responsible for all that had happened. He had to face the things that had been done in his name. But there was a more selfish reason... Hermione. He could not do this alone, any more than he could leave her to face it by herself. If he was to do this, she'd have to be there to help him make sense of it all as she always had.

Problem being, nothing about this made any sense and she was just as lost as he was.

After a full day of work, shifting rubble, finding the occasional body, they both wore the same haunted look. They both felt numb, as if made of stone. This was his home since he was eleven and just like the home he had when he was a baby, Voldemort had destroyed it utterly; made it virtually uninhabitable. Again, like that home... like that life, Voldemort had taken every last good memory he had and shattered it and turned it to dust. Things could be fixed, he was cognizant of that fact, but just because they'd been mended didn't negate the fact that they'd been broken in the first place.

When he looked at Hermione, he knew she felt the same and his heart broke for her. He knew there'd be no explanations. No calm words that'd make any of this better, but she tried anyway and he appreciated her for it. She held him and gave him her words and he loved her for it.

And then words weren't enough.

He'd been the one to find Dennis' body. Dennis and one other...

Her name was Charlotte Perkins. She was fifteen years old and had snuck back into Hogwarts with the Creevey brothers, no doubt wanting to help out with the battle. She was the only girl in her family. Her parents were muggles, meaning that she, like Dennis, had gone into hiding. She had been sorted into Ravenclaw and was the smartest in their year. This was all information he'd found out later, before he'd personally delivered her remains to her parents.

He'd gotten a picture of her from a camera Colin had apparently given to his brother. She was a pretty girl in life. Her dark eyes sparkled as she smiled in the picture, pushing back a lock of hair that had been loosened by the wind. There were a lot of pictures of her on the camera. Harry wondered idly if Dennis might have fancied her.

They'd found her right next to Dennis' broken body, underneath a large pile of rubble from one of the towers that had collapsed. Both their bodies were mangled beyond recognition. He'd been identified by his watch, which had his initials engraved into it. The only thing to identify her was the jewelry she wore. She had three distinctive gold bangles on her right arm, which her mother had given her when she'd left for Hogwarts. On the middle finger of her left hand she had a tiny gold ring on it, with an inscription that Harry couldn't read except for the last bit - _Love, Dennis_.

Dennis hadn't just fancied her then. He'd loved her. And like his own parents, Dennis and Charlotte had fought and died together.

Harry had dearly wished that he'd died for good. He wished he'd have taken a train instead of coming back to this... a pair of young lovers who would never see old age. They would never live to see their hopes and dreams accomplished. Charlotte had wanted to become a healer and Dennis had wanted to be a reporter for the Prophet. They'd never do any of that now. Never get married. Never have children. They were taken from their families before their time and they had both died because of him. If he could, he would have taken their place in a heartbeat.

He'd numbly walked back to his tent, thanking god that Hermione wasn't there, simultaneously wanting and not wanting her with him. Sitting down heavily on his bed, he put his head in his hands and wept. And as if summoned, she came just as he'd completely broken down. She held him, like she always had. She'd run her fingers through his hair and given him her words, just like normal. But it wasn't enough. He wanted to die... to fade away, to not be human anymore if this was all it was but he stubbornly stayed alive.

Something in him snapped, and he embraced her back, holding on with a ferocity that surprised them both. And when they'd pulled back, he crossed the gap separating them. With her, there had always been that gap, that line. He hadn't even realized it was there, but it was. So he crossed it. She'd tried to reason with him, tried to talk sense into him but he was beyond it. He didn't give a damn about any of the reasons she'd put forth.

His whole life he'd been managed. Where he lived, how long he had to stay in that hellhole the Dursleys called home, when people could send him letters, what information he was allowed to know at a time that was invariably inconvenient to him; everyone always shoving expectations of who he was and how he ought to behave.

He'd lived his whole life until now worrying about who he'd hurt by being who he was. And here she was reminding him of all that. He bloody well knew it and he didn't care. For once, he wanted to feel like a normal human being. To do something reckless and impulsive that wouldn't get anyone killed. That'd make him feel like he was here and real and breathing. He wanted to feel something, anything, other than the despair he felt now - this great yawning emptiness.

And so they'd made love. He would call it nothing less. She was one of his oldest friends; his best friend. She knew him better than anyone. Hermione had never abandoned him. She'd always believed him. And even when they didn't agree, everything she'd ever done had been for him. She had always had his best interests at heart, and he loved her for it. If he knew that she thought all she'd been was a replacement for that dot on the Marauder's Map, he would have been deeply insulted, angry even. If he'd wanted Ginny, he would have gone to her. But he didn't want her. She hadn't been through the same things and couldn't possibly understand his feelings in that moment. He wanted Hermione (he needed her).

She was the only thing that had felt real in those weeks after. It was like he was in some kind of fugue state and Hermione was the one thing slowly edging him back into really living again. And then it had ended. She'd finally been able to reason with him. Reminded him of his obligations and who'd they hurt if they carried on. She managed to make him give a damn again (about all the wrong things, though he wouldn't realize this until much, much later). If he hadn't been such a fool, he wouldn't have let her do it. His time with her had never been a mistake, but possibly what had happened after had been. He just hadn't realized it yet.

When it came to love Harry was a poor Seeker who could seemingly never catch the snitch precisely at the right time. After all, he'd spent the first ten years of his life as a virtual stranger to the only family he had left who was unwelcome as he was unwanted, love had been a foreign concept to him.

He'd proposed to Ginny... he had loved her, he really had. It was never his intention to hurt her or Hermione, but if one of them had to be hurt, he thought Hermione would take it better. Ginny lost a brother; she couldn't lose him as well. And Hermione was right, they were with other people. There were obligations and expectations to uphold and so many other people they could hurt. Hermione didn't look at him at all after it was announced. Not once. Even when he suggested that they go with her to find her parents.

The foolish part of him had thought it was a way to make things right. To show her that even if they couldn't carry on as they had been, he still cared for her. The more self-aware part did it out of plain worry. In his grief, he hadn't noticed hers and as his own veil lifted he could see it. He was afraid she'd do something rash, which was absurd. Hermione was far too ordered to do something like that but then he remembered that while she was quite rigid when it came to the rules, she wasn't above breaking them. She wasn't above doing something dangerous or crazy if she thought she had a good enough reason to.

No, Hermione wasn't as above all that as both he and Ron had believed. In the beginning, she had needed encouragement to do the same kind of stupid, foolhardy things they did without even thinking. But by second year she was doing them consciously, _willingly_. And unlike him and Ron, Hermione didn't just do things on a whim, she did things because she'd thought them out thoroughly and that was far more terrifying.

He'd tried to explain his reasoning to Ron, but he hadn't listened. Of course, he hadn't given him the full truth but he'd tried his best to impress upon his friend that something was very wrong with the third member of their little trio.

"C'mon, Harry. This is Hermione. You're worrying too much."

As it turned out, he hadn't worried near enough.

It was Ginny who'd found the letter. She'd woken him up, in tears, with it clutched in her trembling hand. Half awake, he'd pushed his glasses on his face and read it. She was going to Melbourne on her own. _Don't worry._ She just needed a bit of time to herself as she was feeling out of sorts. _Give me two weeks_, the letter had said. _I need two weeks to sort myself out, on my own. Please don't worry._

She expected them to believe that. But Harry didn't. Her excuses about why she wanted to do this was a lie (he would discover very quickly that the whole damned thing was one enormous lie). She hadn't left to sort herself out, not really. _'She left because of me. It's my fault. I finally asked too much of her and she left... she left me.'_ Those thoughts ricocheted in his head on an endless and destructive loop. During the Horcrux hunt he'd wondered when she'd leave, what it would take. Now he knew. _Please don't worry_, she'd written that in various forms a number of times in the letter. As if those words in whatever combination was enough to make him not agonize over this situation.

"Get your father," he'd ordered without even looking at Ginny, his hands trembling.

He woke Ron up and shoved the letter into his hands, pacing back and forth while he waited for him to finish reading. When he was done, Ron looked up at him, pale with shock. Shortly thereafter, it was chaos. Molly was attempting to calm Ginny, unsuccessfully. Ron was still pale, dark smudges under his eyes as he sat at kitchen table staring at nothing. Percy was sitting next to him, jabbering on and on about how it'd be all right. They'd find her. But from the look on his face, Harry wasn't so sure, seemed more like empty platitudes to him. Bill and Arthur were the only ones with a modicum of sense. They were talking with two Aurors, who'd they'd called over the moment they'd read the letter.

Ron had given them the most current picture they'd had. And everyone, Harry included, had given them details of what they could remember about the night before; how Hermione acted, what she might have been wearing, and the note. But they'd been told point blank that looking for her wasn't a priority. She had left of her own volition, as far as they were concerned. It didn't matter if she was a war hero. It didn't matter she was Harry Potter's best friend.

One of them hand made the offhand comment, "She's of age and has every right to leave if she wants."

The Ministry was stretched thin, much too thin. Voldemort era Ministry workers who hadn't resisted the regime and had an active hand in war crimes had scattered like cockroaches. All that was left were those who had resisted and come back. They simply lacked numbers, even with the influx of former resistance members. They had Death Eaters to round up and there were hundreds of other missing persons who _hadn't _left of their own free will. Once they had freed up some of their personnel, they'd look into it and get back to them. They estimated it'd be at least three weeks for them to schedule some time and then they'd left. Harry had never in his life been so infuriated, as if it wasn't dangerous for her to be on her own, what with Death Eaters still about. Absolutely furious, he stormed up into Ron's room to prepare to find her himself.

Ron had followed him, the shock having worn off somewhat. He watched his friend as he threw things into a rucksack, nonplussed. "Harry... Harry, what are you doing?"

"I'm going to look for her," Harry replied roughly, angrily closing the flap on his rucksack as he stood. "Going to bring her back."

"But... you heard the Aurors, they said..."

"Three weeks," Harry growled, barely holding his temper. "They said it'd take three weeks for them to look into it. Anything could happen to her in that time. I'm not going to sit here and wait patiently for them to get their heads out of their asses."

"But... it's Hermione. She can take care of herse-"

"YOU HEARD THEM, DIDN'T YOU?! THERE ARE STILL DEATH EATERS OUT THERE, RON! SHE'S OUR FRIEND! _MY_ FRIEND! AND I JUST KILLED THEIR BEST MATE! YOU THINK THEY WON'T BE OUT THERE LOOKING FOR PAYBACK?!" Harry bellowed, his eyes blazing. He stood there shaking, almost pleased at the panicked look on Ron's face. He went on, more calmly this time, "Besides, the longer we wait the bigger lead she has on us. Merlin knows when she left. We can't... we can't just do _nothing_."

"H-her note said..."

"I don't care what her bloody note said! I _told_ you something was wrong. I don't think she's thinking clearly. I'm going after her and if you want to come with, fine. But don't try to stop me."

There was a flicker of resistance on Ron's face, something jealous and possessive. "She's _my _girlfriend."

Harry didn't know why, but his pronouncement irked him. He realized that he wasn't really acting like a concerned _friend_ right now, that his actions were more akin to a concerned _lover_. And if he was honest, that's what he was, wasn't he. But since Ron seemed to enjoy having the official title, the right to call her that, then where did he get off acting like this was all okay... where did he get off not being worried sick about her like he should be.

"Well, _your _girlfriend is missing. And since you don't seem to give a damn, someone else has to," Harry said lowly, pushing past Ron and pelting down the stairs.

There were voices that called after him that he didn't heed. He could hear Ron's heavy steps just behind him, but Harry was faster. Ron ought to have thanked whatever god looked after fools, because Harry would have hexed him if he'd tried to lay a hand on him. He made it past the wards and used an old gum wrapper to make a portkey quite illegally to the precise coordinates she'd written down in her note. There was no way he'd wait for more legal means of travel. They'd already lost so much time.

And when he got to the location she'd indicated, he'd didn't have the words to express his own confusion. Her note had said Melbourne. He wasn't much of a world traveler and he'd never been to Australia, but this didn't look like Melbourne. He was on a road in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night, looking at a sign that said in large black lettering: "NO THROUGH ROAD - JOINT DEFENCE FACILITY PINE GAP."

"Bloody hell," he whispered, dropping his pack to wrestle out the copy of her note he'd made. Looking at the coordinates, he read them over and over to make sure they were right and turned on his heel. And with a crack, he landed in the exact same spot he'd been in.

Several seconds later no less than five Australian Aurors from the Ministry down under had surrounded him, wands drawn. Once taken into custody, they found out who he was, naturally. The British Ministry was informed, and he was quickly let go with a formal warning. All the Australian Aurors had a good laugh about how he'd managed to apparate just outside a joint Australian/American military defense facility.

"Seems like someone was taking the piss out of you, mate," one of them had chuckled.

Harry didn't find it particularly funny. Either Hermione had given them incorrect coordinates, which was unlikely, or she'd given them purposefully wrong ones, which was sadly _more_ likely. She hadn't wanted them... no, him, she hadn't wanted _him_ to follow her. He briefly thought about sticking around to look for her in Melbourne. But the city was simply too big. Realistically, he'd never find her. Until he had more information, it'd be fruitless.

He hadn't wanted to go back to the Burrow, tail between his legs. Instead, he went to an International Floo Network fireplace to get to London from Melbourne and from there went to Grimmauld Place. Once he got there, he made a beeline to his old room, tossing his rucksack carelessly into the corner. There was a huge part of him that was so angry he wanted to throw something. The same part of him that had impulsively destroyed Professor Dumbledore's things in his office at the end of fifth year nearly roared to life, but he was so tired - so very tired. So he threw himself on his bed and fell asleep.

The next day he sent Kreacher with a note to the Burrow to let them know he was all right. He mentioned that he'd been unable to find Hermione, obliquely hinting she'd given them incorrect directions. It was nearly two weeks before Ron showed up. The whole affair was awkward, deeply awkward, but somehow they'd powered through it and they made up. And eventually, Harry had told him about his aborted trip.

"So, the directions in the note were really wrong?"

"Yeah, they were."

Ron laughed nervously. "You reckon it was just a mistake or..."

He let out a ragged sounding sigh. "No, she wouldn't make a mistake. She didn't want us to follow her."

"What do we do?"

"We wait, I guess," Harry answered hollowly.

And wait they did. Not just the three weeks the Aurors had quoted them but a little under t two months. Harry wasn't fundamentally interested in their investigation, as he was keenly aware that Hermione wasn't where she had said she'd be. Funnily enough, the Ministry came up with the same conclusion. In that time, the news of his proposal to Ginny had been leaked and he'd been forced to confirm it. Worse, Ginny had been pushing to set a date which they'd announced at the same time.

"So many terrible things had happened; wouldn't it be wonderful if there was a bit of good news?"

So he caved. She wanted to get married next June just after she graduated. Her parents had protested, it was too soon, they were too young. Ginny had shot back hotly that Harry's parents had gotten married young. It was a low blow, in his opinion, but he didn't feel like arguing with her. This was what she wanted. He was too busy with Auror training to care, really. Well, that, and his mind was turning over Hermione's disappearance. Where was she now? How had she gotten there? Would she eventually come back as she'd obliquely hinted at in her note?

It was stupid to hope but it was all he had left. And whether it was a stroke of genius or pure desperation, he began to investigate further on his own.

When they'd originally left on the Horcrux hunt, she'd asked if she could store some things from her parent's house in Grimmauld Place. He'd agreed and it was all still packed away on the fourth floor. When he wasn't training, he was up there going through every single last box. There were well over twenty boxes, four of them filled with photo albums neatly organized by year. Flipping through them, there were so many pictures of her... birthdays, various holidays, vacations.

There were pictures of her parent's wedding; her mother in a lovely white peasant dress with flowers in her unruly hair, her father in a fairly terrible crushed velvet tuxedo and a plain, white yarmulke. They were standing under of a kind of canopy that was decorated beautifully with a profusion sunflowers and red roses, surrounded by friends and family as they held each other's hand tightly. Her father's leg was lifted up, poised to crush a glass wrapped in a napkin on the floor. The look of pure, unadulterated joy on their faces was infectious.

Harry wasn't particularly religious but the Dursleys were. He knew because they'd gone to a church a good thirty minutes from their home every Sunday. Of course, he'd never gone with. He was either stuck at Mrs. Figg's house or left alone with strict orders not to touch anything. It never occurred to him that any of his friends were religious, which was a bit stupid of him. Still, it was strange after knowing her so long to realize that Hermione and her family were Jewish. She'd always given them Christmas presents so he'd assumed... why had she never even mentioned it to them? Was her family not observant? He wished he could ask her.

Most of the rest of the boxes were books, furniture shrunk by magic, and paperwork - loads and loads of paperwork. He'd found bank statements for her parents and their practice. There were two small packets with birth certificates, driver's licenses and passports in them, which he thought was a little strange. They were labeled with her parent's names. The third packet with Hermione's name was ominously empty.

Out of pure curiosity, he pulled out her mother's birth certificate. He opened it up to find it was entirely in French. From what he could glean, her name had been Hélène Didier before she'd gotten married. She'd been born in Paris in 1956, just four years before his own mother. Also inside Helen's envelope was her marriage license. Richard Granger and Helen Didier had married on 7 September, 1976. There was also her license to practice dentistry and a diploma from Queen Mary University, dated for July of 1980. Around about the time he was ready to be born, Hermione's mum had just graduated from dental school. It was strange to find this out, in this way. Despite his motives - vis-à-vis finding Hermione - it felt like he was invading their privacy somehow and yet...

'I should have known this,' he thought guiltily, 'I was her friend... I should have known all of this.'

Shaking his head, he carefully tucked it all away and put it back into the box. There was nothing helpful there. He turned to another box, which was full of what could only be childhood mementos. There were a ton of little colorful horses that looked worse for wear, a pair of ceramic cats, a cast of what could only be Hermione's teeth in plaster, several certificates for awards she'd won at piano competitions, a number of Moleskine journals, a worn pair of ballet slippers belonging to a very young girl, and a small box with sparkly pink flowers all over it. He drew the little pink box out. It felt so wrong to open it, but he did anyway.

There wasn't much inside, just a load of jewelry clearly meant for a little girl. Plastic bracelets in several different colors, a gaudy resin ring with a preserved flower in it, assorted charms from a broken charm bracelet, and a little jade goat ornament. There was a miniature ballerina in it, which would have moved and played music had he bothered to wind it. And there was a mirror, which seemed to be oddly skewed as if whoever had glued it to the top just hadn't cared. Harry touched it curiously. Examining it further, he noticed the entire top of the box was skewed. Like someone had peeled it back and re-glued it.

Pressing his lips together, he carefully picked at the pink fabric at the top of the box. It didn't come away easily but working it carefully he eventually peeled it back. A note fell out of it. His hands were trembling as he unfolded it. In her neat, loopy handwriting it began:

_Dear Harry and Ron,_

_If you are reading this, it means that I didn't make it. I want you both to know that you were the best friends I have ever had. That being said, there are instructions on how you might restore my parent's memories in a box labeled Misc. China. I've left some things out of the notes I left behind so if someone else intercepts them it will be harder to decipher. Please, if it's not too much trouble, see to it that you give it to Professor Flitwick. I'd very much like my parents to know what happened to me and I trust that the Professor would be able to assist you both. _

_Love, _

_Hermione_

He stood up suddenly, not caring a whit that he'd dropped the little music box and spilled its contents. It warbled 'Clair de Lune' from the floor as he took several strides over to the other boxes. He moved them aside until he found the one she had indicated. In it were piles and piles of notebooks and another note (which was as heavily charmed as her first one so that only he or Ron could read it) where she admitted that she'd lied to them. Yes, she'd modified her parent's memories but instead of sending them to Australia, she sent them to New Zealand. She gave him reasons for her obfuscation, which didn't really make him feel all that confident in her trust in them. But he saw her point. He was glad Ron wasn't here, he was sure to have made a bigger deal of it than it was.

His heart thrummed. There was a chance they could find her. He had her parent's actual aliases and their address in New Zealand. This time he'd be prepared. He'd be more careful. And he'd bring Ron.

He had hoped, perhaps somewhat naively, that if he and Ron went to New Zealand that he'd find her there with her parents. Instead, they'd found Bettina and William Robards who weren't aware they had a daughter at all. He'd remembered clearly walking into the Gallery her mother owned. Bettina (aka Helen) stood and greeted him with a smile at the small information desk. He knew it was her; she looked exactly as she had in the photos.

Feeling inexplicably nervous, he looked at Ron before asking, "Is Hermione here?"

The woman gave a little start. "Um, I'm sorry, we don't have anyone by that name who works here. Can I help you with something else?"

Ice filled his veins. "S-she doesn't work here," he stammered, his mouth felt like it was filled with molasses. "She's... she's your daughter."

"I think you must have mistaken me for someone else, young man. I don't have a daughter," she said coldly, her hand drifting towards the phone on her desk.

Ron stepped in, smiling nervously. "What I think my friend meant was... our friend, Hermione, might have been by this place. She's gone missing, see." And then he stage whispered, "My friend here is really gutted by it and I guess he just got confused." Ron turned to him, his smile looking more like a grimace at this point. In a very high-pitched voice, he turned and prompted, "Why don't you show her the picture, Harry?"

He wanted to point out that as her boyfriend Ron ought to be the one with a picture. That it was weird for a best friend to have one and not the guy who was romantically involved with her. But he neglected to because he didn't want to go down that rabbit hole. Instead, he pulled out the picture he had of her in his wallet that he'd taken from one of the albums.

Hermione's mum took the photo warily, examining it for several seconds. There was a flicker of something in her eyes, something almost like recognition. "Yes," she said slowly. "Yes, she came in a few months ago." Her voice was soft, dreamy. With a sigh, she shook herself and continued, "She bought one of my paintings. The one with yellow camellias... which I thought was rather apt because she had such sad eyes. She left after that, never indicated where she was going. I'm sorry I can't help with more..." she trailed off, the tone of her voice making it clear they weren't welcome here anymore.

They left shortly thereafter to find a room at the small wizarding community found in downtown Christchurch. It was too late to portkey back to London, so they'd chosen to stay the night and catch the first available slot the next morning. After eating, Ron went back to their room to take a nap. The whole day had left him exhausted. Harry was the exact opposite. He was so full of adrenaline that he didn't think he could sleep if he tried. Instead, he went back to the Gallery before closing. He wanted to know why Hermione's mum thought it was apt that she bought that painting. She was surprised he'd come back, not all that pleasantly. But she'd told him what he wanted to know.

"She looked quite heartbroken," she'd said, her gaze piercing Harry as surely as if she'd jammed a spear into his heart. "I'm not so old that I don't remember that look," she sighed; it was a terribly tired sound. "I thought it was apt because in some cultures, yellow camellias are symbolic for longing for the one you love."

Harry did not know how to process the information, what he ought to make of it. He didn't know if he wanted to. So he focused on the facts they knew. Hermione had been here but she hadn't broken the memory charm on her parents. It meant that now they had no leads, no idea where she'd gone. His only hope was that if they could break the memory charm, her parents might know where she went. Honestly, he wasn't sure they'd know much more than he would, but it was the only lead he could think of. So he did what her letter in the box had suggested. He gave all her notes to Professor Flitwick.

And when he did, the diminutive Charms Professor had gaped openly as he went over them, asking in a breathlessly astonished squeak, "You said she told you that she'd simply modified her parent's memories, correct?"

Harry thought for a moment, trying to remember exactly how she'd put it. He knew she'd said something more about it but for the life of him he couldn't remember. His state of mind was a bit of a mess at the moment. "Yes, she... that's just how she put it."

Flitwick frowned, rifling through the notes errantly as he mumbled to himself. "You're _sure _that's how she said it... that she told you all she did was a simple memory modification?"

"More or less."

"More or less?"

Feeling nettled, Harry could feel the tether on his temper shortening. He was just about to ask what any of this had to do with anything when Ron suddenly spoke up. "Well, she did say something about them having new names, I think. And that she'd made them forget her... and all the things she'd told them about Harry." Ron glowered as the two other people in the room gazed at him in amazement. "What?! You know, sometimes I do listen when she's talking, even if I don't understand half of what she says."

Professor Flitwick sighed deeply. "Well, I'm afraid this complicates things."

Harry and Ron shared a look. "What do you mean?" Harry asked, perhaps a bit less politely than he could have.

"From what you've told me and what I can glean from her notes, Miss Granger didn't perform a simple memory charm," he explained, gesturing at Hermione's files expansively. "According to this, she created a lifetime of memories and records out of whole cloth."

When all he got was blank looks, he clarified that the magic Hermione had performed had never been done. You can obliviate someone, which would take away the memory of an event. You could use various spells or curses to compel someone to do something, such as suddenly wanting to move to Australia. There was even a spell or two to implant altered memories, though the magic behind it was a touch dark. But there was no way to completely fabricate new identities by magic, at least according to everything Filius Flitwick had ever known. This was completely new magic... some of the most impressively complex magic he'd ever seen. The theories she'd put forth in her notes were nothing short of revolutionary.

But there was a caveat. Her research was incomplete. She had created a new kind of memory charm, but she had only just started on figuring out a counter charm for it, her notes indicated as much. For Harry, what it all boiled down to was that it'd take time for him to figure out how to reverse whatever it was Hermione did, if it was even possible.

Harry had decided on the spot that it wasn't worth wasting their time, bitterly accepting it was yet another fruitless lead. Flitwick disagreed and asked if he might keep her notes. He and McGonagall both agreed that the theories put forth in her research materials represented a significant magical achievement. They wanted to honor that by studying it further, indicating that they intended to publish it underneath her name. Harry agreed easily. He didn't understand a word of those notes but if they could be used for the betterment of the wizarding world, he was sure Hermione would approve of her professors using them for such a purpose.

* * *

Everyone wanted a Harry chapter and here we are! Pt1. of a chapter that's all Harry. Happy Valentine's Day for all that celebrate!


	6. Chapter 6

And just like that, time rolled forward. He was married in June and while the event itself was happy, how he'd gotten there was marred by strife. Ginny was constantly disappointed by his indifference when it came to the preparations. It would have been hard for him to be fully engaged in it even if he wasn't consumed by his own personal investigation into Hermione's disappearance. Auror training kept him quite busy. The classes were tough, but the physical training was worse. He was braindead and bone tired most days.

She had wanted a big wedding, just like Bill's. But unlike her brother's wedding, hers wouldn't be ruined by the war intruding. It'd be a real celebration of the light triumphing over the dark. He got it, he really did, even though he'd have preferred something smaller, more intimate. He didn't understand why she even needed his help; she knew what she wanted. Quite frankly, he couldn't care less about flowers or the color of the bridesmaid's dresses. He was marrying her, not some ruddy dresses. What did any of this matter?

And no matter how hard he tried to explain to her that he was exhausted and though he was quite glad she was having fun with this; he'd just like to rest... she just didn't get it. Because she somehow juggled her duties as a Hogwarts student with her duties as a bride, she felt he ought to be able to do the same. He'd pointed out that Auror training was vastly different from studying at Hogwarts. It was far more demanding on your body and mind.

Besides, Molly was doing most of the leg work anyway. He knew for a fact that all Ginny had really done was pick out her own dress, her mother had been handling most everything else which he wasn't shy about pointing out. That particular fight made the rows that Hermione and Ron had gotten into seem like pleasant teatime conversation by comparison. They'd nearly ended it before _it _even began. But somehow, they'd managed to persevere and move past it. Most likely because she'd noticed some of the rather nasty bruising from one of his training sessions when they were snogging.

If he was being honest, Ginny had a point; he sort of lost himself when in training. He pushed harder and faster than he needed to. He worked overtime, piling on extra classes with the kind of zeal Hermione had always tried to instill in him. To those who knew him well, the transformation was a bit alarming. It didn't help matters that he had a long history of becoming single-minded about things, to the detriment of his personal and professional relationships. This time was no different than any other time before.

It normally took four years to become an Auror. Harry could have skipped all those years by virtue of being the one to defeat Voldemort. But he didn't. In his secret heart, he had pushed himself because he secretly wanted to make Hermione proud once he found her. So he took all his required classes and more, passing with distinction. He breezed through every last examination and was welcomed into a post as a rookie Auror a year and a half after he'd began. He was the most promising graduate the academy had ever seen.

A distinction he nearly threw away.

Once he'd become a full-fledged Auror, he had, of course, looked into his friend's disappearance. Her case hadn't yet been closed, as per protocol. Being so close to the case, Harry wasn't technically allowed to have anything to do with it. Despite knowing this, he couldn't stop himself from interfering. He hounded the two other Aurors working the case. They were deferent at first, because of who he was and the man he'd defeated. But their leniency soon wore off. He was reprimanded a number of times and then suspended twice. They'd never go so far as to threaten to sack him, they knew better, but they did their level best to force him to toe the line.

Fact was, despite his insubordination regarding the Granger case, he was an excellent Auror. When it came to closing cases, his numbers were incredible. And of those closed cases, nearly 97% resulted in a secured conviction. The Barristers at the DMLE loved him; the cases he worked were easy. His paperwork was orderly, he gathered evidence meticulously, and who in Merlin's name wouldn't take Harry Potter at his word. All they had to do was put him on the stand.

That being said, his interference with the Granger case meant that he was often passed up for promotion, even though it was clear he deserved to be fast tracked into a command position. Worse, his unyielding dedication to the case caused friction in his marriage. Ginny wasn't happy that he hadn't gotten promoted, true, but it wasn't enough to really damage the relationship... if that's all it had been. It was his obsession with Hermione - his need to find her that was at the heart of the problem.

It was also due to the pervasive media coverage.

The Daily Prophet had a field day over Hermione's disappearance. It had been a relentless and awful circus that had gone on for three full years. Harry had long ago learned to deal with his life being under a microscope, but Ginny, who'd only ever been on the periphery of it, had not. Every single day there was some new featured article or update on the case, and they were almost always filled to the brim with blatant lies and half-truths. His favorite was when someone leaked the charges of insubordination and his suspensions because he got 'too involved' with her case.

The headline blared: '**Potter's Folly: Defeating He Who Must Not Be Named Is Not Enough For The Boy Who Lived**' and detailed how his intrusion was bogging down the detectives who were "diligently" working day and night to find Miss Granger. Then there was the insinuation of why he was obsessing about it, bringing up those old Triwizard Tournament rumors. Once again, he was painted as an attention seeking lunatic who was madly in love with his best friend and wanted to singlehandedly solve the case for his own glory. It was mostly horseshit. But it had hurt Ginny deeply. She'd always been insecure when it came to Hermione.

During one of their many rows about the subject, she had tearfully admitted that she felt like there were three people in the marriage. "And the one w-who isn't even here... the o-one who isn't e-even your w-w-wife is more important to y-you."

He didn't even bother to argue with her. She was right, after all. From that point forward, he'd stopped bothering the detectives about Hermione's case. All the boxes of leads and information he had were packed up. The 'war room' he'd set up in the old drawing room in Grimmauld place was abandoned. It was over. He'd promised her it was over.

When they'd declared Hermione dead last year, he pretended not to hear the nearly inaudible sigh of relief from Ginny, who was at his side when they'd announced it. He pretended it hadn't made him furious, that he didn't hate her just a little bit for being relieved. He pretended not to be angry and insulted that the DMLE and the Auror department had barely made an effort to find her to begin with and had given up at the nearest available opportunity. He pretended that it didn't irritate him that everyone got on with their life so easily while he sat here pretending and feeling miserable inside.

But he'd done what he promised. He'd let it go, for the most part. If he thought about it now and again, well, no one would ever know. Ginny rarely asked questions when he got moody. He could tell her he was just thinking about work and it wouldn't really be a lie. She wasn't persistent like Hermione, who would have hounded him until he told her what was bothering him. It had been annoying sometimes... but he could also admit the he liked it when she did stuff like that. It meant she cared about him. And he _liked _talking to her. He _missed_ talking to her. Missed that exasperated tone she got when she thought he was being stupid. Missed the sweet way she'd say 'oh, Harry' before explaining things to him. Even now, he found himself turning to his right to ask her a question, only to remember she wasn't there.

If he was truthful, he had never wanted to stop looking for her - to this day. He hadn't wanted to give up on her. But he had...

He stopped to make his wife happy. And when he stopped, it had made his superiors happy enough with him that he'd been quickly promoted. He'd made Assistant Chief Auror just last year - the youngest to ever hold the position. He was well on his way to becoming the head of the department, if he wanted it. All because he'd let it go... let _her_ go.

For almost three years he'd kept his promise.

Spread out across his desk was a series of photographs of a woman and a child. The angle of the photo allowed him to see the woman's face but not the boy's. It allowed him to easily identify her. She had dyed her dark hair a light caramel color that suited her well. It was shorter than he remembered it but just as wild and untamable as ever. It was wrapped up in a knitted scarf that Dobby had made her for Christmas in fifth year. He remembered it was her favorite scarf for that purpose, even though the colors the house elf had chosen were hideous. Her dark eyes glittered as she smiled and caught the dark-haired little boy pelting at her at full speed, wincing when his broom banged into her head.

To anyone who didn't know her it looked like a sweet picture of a mother and a son. The kind of heartwarming photo most Quidditch fans would love to see in a feature about their local league. But he knew the woman in the photograph... he knew what her real smiles looked like and the one she wore in this picture was most assuredly not a genuine smile. It was the smile that hovered between mortal terror and blessed relief. The boy had done something to scare the living daylights out of her and she was happy he was on the ground now.

He'd know _that_ smile anywhere. She'd given it to him a thousand times, after all.

According to the note Dean had sent him, the picture was taken at the Paris Urban Quidditch League, Port d'Ivry branch. It was taken by a well-known professional Quidditch photographer named Jehanne-Lucie Méliès. The photo itself was taken in December of 2005 around Christmas. It was July 2006 now, only three days before his birthday. It had been about seven months, then, give or take.

She was in Paris right now and had been there long enough that she had a child. He supposed it might be someone else's - perhaps a friend's child - but the senses he'd honed as an Auror told him the kid had to be hers. In the sixth photo in the series, she'd held the boy out as if she was examining him; gently touching him as if she was making sure everything was okay - it was in the way she kissed his cheek and held him closer. It was something he'd seen both Fleur and Audrey do a hundred times when their children had hurt themselves at the Burrow.

Guessing the ages of a young child from only a photograph was rather difficult proposition and it didn't help they hadn't caught the boy at a better angle; all he could see was the back of his head. His best guess was the boy war around four... maybe five. She wouldn't move around if she had a young child, Hermione was far too responsible for that. This meant that she felt secure enough in her alias that she hadn't moved in a long time.

There was no question she had an alias. He'd figured that out ages ago. It was why no owl was able to deliver a letter to Hermione Granger, because Hermione Granger was someone else now. It was why her envelope was empty and her parent's was not. She had planned on removing their memory charm, therefore her parent's real vital records needed to be intact. But when she'd disappeared all those years ago, she'd taken her own records with her. He was sure that she hadn't meant to make the leave permanent, at first. That somewhere along the line she had made the split-second decision to alter her records - it had been as spur of the moment as Hermione got. The real wrench would be figuring out what that alias was.

Of course, knowing where she was _now _didn't help him at all. He wasn't as arrogant as he was when he was younger, popping off to Australia in hotheaded fury like an enormous idiot. Paris was a very big city. Without knowing what she was calling herself now, it'd be impossible. He needed a name. That would mean attempting to trace her journey from New Zealand to France, which at this point would be difficult, to put it mildly. Worse, he knew he couldn't use many of the resources he had in the Auror Office. It'd have to be entirely off the record.

Staring at the pictures arranged across his desk, he clasped his hands, one thumb rubbing against the other as he thought. Was he really going to do this? He'd promised... but it wasn't like it was before, when he had nothing at all to go on. He had pictures now and a clear idea of where she really was.

_But you promised_...

He should just hand it over to his deputy, let her give it to the brass upstairs and leave it for them to figure out. Knowing them, they'd stare at it for a bit before putting it a box and forgetting about it. Assistant Commissioner Dowds had told him point blank last year that Hermione would have to walk directly into the DMLE herself before they'd reverse their decision to declare her dead.

Sighing quietly, he picked out the last photo in the series, the one where the smile she wore was genuine. She was looking at the boy as he spoke, smoothing his messy, wind-blown hair down with a lovely smile on her face. The boy was gesturing wildly, explaining something to her as she listened raptly. She'd built a whole life without them (without him), he realized it then.

And suddenly he was furious at her. Why hadn't she just said something? Explained things? Was it so hard to send word that she was okay... he could have accepted the fact that she didn't want him in her life. He knew he'd fucked up. In the past, when he'd done something stupid or insensitive, she'd never hesitated to tell him off, what had made this any different? Jesus, she'd launched a volley of birds at Ron once... he would have taken his lumps. He deserved it, after all.

In fact, he didn't even need an explanation for why she'd gone. All she would have had to do was owl him to let him know she was okay. He supposed this photo was evidence enough of that, but it stung... it hurt beyond words.

So here he was, staring at this photo wondering if it'd be worth it to start his search for her all over again as his entire body hummed with adrenaline. He had always been brash, reacting with emotion when cool logic was needed. Time had tempered it some, but it was still there simmering just beneath the surface.

He carefully folded the picture of her smiling genuinely and pocketed it. The rest he gathered up with Dean's note and tucked them into a folder. Without a thought, he called in his deputy and handed over the file, giving her instructions to turn it over to Dowd before letting her know he'd be gone for the rest of the day. He strode out of the Ministry purposefully. Usually there were people hailing him, who'd try to stop him with things they thought required his notice. The stormy look on his face warned them away.

Once he was outside the Ministry's wards, he immediately apparated to Grimmauld Place. Standing on the top step, he inhaled deeply, his hand touching the door - splaying his fingers over the worn wood as he contemplated what it was he was doing. He was consciously going to break his promise and he found he didn't give half a damn. Opening the door, he crossed that unspoken line for good as the door closed behind him.

He hadn't set foot here for almost three years. It was as dank and unpleasant as ever. Years ago, he had thought about renovating it and renting it out at Ginny's suggestion, but he could never bring himself to start the process. Even though Sirius hated being here, it was still connected to him. Besides, it'd break Kreacher's heart and Harry couldn't do that to the old house elf.

When the war had ended, he'd shown the old elf the destroyed locket, so that he knew Harry had kept his promise to finish what Regulus had started which had caused Kreacher to burst into a bout of loud, ugly sobs. From that moment forward, the elf had been extremely loyal and had provided years of good service. He kept Grimmauld Place clean as well as Harry's small cottage in Godric's Hollow and the flat in London. Harry thought it would be an insult to gut the house Kreacher cared for so dearly, not to mention unimaginably cruel.

He now mostly used it as a sort of storage space for things they didn't need. Most of it was in the attic, with the exception of the boxes Hermione had left which he'd moved into the old room she'd once shared with Ginny. Coincidentally, that was also where he'd stored all the boxes full of information he'd gathered when looking into her disappearance. Instead of going to the fourth floor, he made his way over to the drawing room. He called Kreacher and seconds later the house elf appeared with a loud crack.

"You called, Master Potter."

"Kreacher, could you please bring down all the boxes relating to the Granger case and clean up this room and get it ready for me?"

The elf eyed him, asking him cautiously with no small amount of disapproval, "Master is looking for Miss Granger again?"

It was no secret that the elf to this day disliked the very idea of Hermione. He called her Miss Granger only because Harry had ordered him to.

"Yes, I am. Don't allow anyone but myself in this room and tell no one what I'm looking into, please." He turned on his heel to head for the fourth floor, knowing that his orders would be obeyed - albeit somewhat grudgingly.

There was one last line to be crossed. When he had first found the box with all her childhood mementoes in them, there had been six Moleskine journals which he had never opened much less looked through. He had felt bad enough that he'd pawed through their family photos and all their vital records. But her journals... it was beyond the pale, if he was honest. Besides, each journal had a year printed on them and they only covered first through sixth year at Hogwarts, and at the time he'd reasoned there was nothing in them that'd be relevant to the case. So he let them be.

But now... now that persistent part of him that was endlessly curious about their contents would not be denied. Most likely, there was nothing in them that would help figure out her new alias. He knew that, he wasn't a fool. It was more the lure of getting inside her head, of seeing what she thought about without all the filters she put on. He'd realized long ago there was a lot about Hermione that he didn't know.

The room where they were stored was dark and quiet. It was obvious a number of other boxes had just been removed, now residing in the old war room. The rest that were left were lined up against the wall, barely visible in the dim light. He opened the musty curtains, disturbing three years' worth of dust. Light filled the room as he coughed roughly before he began searching. It didn't take long to find it. Opening the box carefully, he rummaged through it until he pulled the journals out one by one.

It would make more sense to start at the one marked 1991-1992, as that was their first year and the earliest journal in the series. Instead, he picked the one marked 1996-1997, which was their sixth year. That year had been fraught with tension and perhaps the start of how everything became the way it was now. With great trepidation, he held the journal in his hands and opened it slowly. The very first page of the book had her name and address printed neatly and a sweet message of what kind of reward she'd provide if someone found it when it was lost. He smiled wistfully, brushing his index finger over the words. The second page was a revelation. There was no loopy handwriting, no dated entry that scrupulously recorded what she'd been thinking on that day. Instead, it was two full pages of drawings - _Nothing_ but drawings.

There was a remarkably accurate full-page portrait of Hermione's mum, and a very messy sketch of their compartment on the Hogwart's express. He flipped to the next page; this one was almost entirely portraits. One drawing was of Ron sleeping on the train, his mouth wide open and another of Harry himself at sixteen looking pensively out the window. There were various others, all students or staff of Hogwarts. Each page was something new - there were scientific illustrations of various magical plants, detailed sketches of magical creatures, more than one study of the grounds surrounding the school and an entire two page illustration in ink of Hogwarts itself from the lake that she'd animated to make it look like was snowing. There were a number of still lives. And portrait after portrait after portrait. The subjects she captured most frequently were of Ron and him, of course. Ginny made appearances here and there, so did Luna and Neville. There were also scads of portraits of students he knew, others he didn't, not to mention faculty and staff.

There was some writing, but it was sparse and written almost entirely in French. It usually only appeared on the pages with scientific illustrations, though it occasionally could be found on some of the portrait pages. On the one dated November 1st, there was a lovely portrait of Ron which had been brutally defaced. An addendum had been made in shaky black ink that was dreadfully smudged. It read, '_va te faire fourte, connard_' - Harry didn't need to know French to understand it was an insult. If memory served, the day after this drawing was made, Ron had snogged Lavender Brown in the Gryffindor Common room in full view of everyone. Hermione had been devastated.

He sat there for a long moment, gazing at the drawing. His finger carefully tracing the words she'd left behind, wondering what they really meant - wondering if she thought those words, whatever they meant, about him. Closing his eyes briefly, painfully, he shook his head as he put the journal down.

At random, he picked another journal and when he finished that one, he picked another and another. Each page filled with thousands of little drawings. All of them were like that. There were portraits of people long gone in the pages of those journals: Lupin, Sirius, Cedric Diggory, Dumbledore, Fred and a number of animated drawings of Tonks illustrating her rare abilities as a Metamorphamagus. He felt tears rolling down his cheeks... he wasn't sure when that started, but he wasn't exactly able to stop. It took several minutes for him to get himself back into order. He had no idea she drew. No idea at all that she was this talented. Even Dean Thomas wasn't this good, and he'd been considered the best artist in their year.

His favorite was a study she'd done of Sirius' hands. She'd captured the gnarled joints, the scars, and the numerous tattoos so well that it looked more like a photo than a drawing... he wondered if she'd asked him to model for her or if she really was just that observant. He liked to think she did ask him to model for her. His godfather had such a quirky sense of humor and he'd find the whole concept amusing; he could almost imagine the scene - him just sitting there while she drew, fidgeting and asking increasingly annoying questions until she told him exasperatedly to sit still.

It was one of a thousand questions he had saved to ask her when he finally found her. Because he _would _find her this time - he would find her and bring her back, even if it took him the rest of his life.

_J`envoie valser__  
__Les preuves d`amour__  
__En or plaqué__  
__Puisque tu m`serres très fort__  
__C`est là mon trésor__  
__C`est toi__  
__Toi qui vaut de l`or_


End file.
